Chasing Mr X
by Ashabagawa
Summary: The team are reunited again when Arthur recieves a letter from the mysterious Mr X, claiming to have their best interests at heart. However, things quickly turn ugly as the team fight for their lives in the most terrifying realm of all: the real world.
1. Temperamental Suspension

Unfortunately for Arthur, the harness holding him to the building had snapped, leaving him falling roughly twenty-three floors down the spine of the skyscraper until he made quite a sudden introduction with the pavement below – leading ultimately to certain death.

Things were not looking good.

As he flew past Eames and Ariadne, both frozen in disbelief as their colleague fell from his useless harness, he wished he had a moment to talk to them, to say goodbye. But then, gravity doesn't really have any time for exchanging pleasantries. Instead, he hurtled past them, floor by floor, more certain of his fate with every meter that passed. He heard Ariadne yelling his name into the wind, about ten seconds too late, too late to do anything about it.

And then of course the rope snagged.

Squeezing his eyes shut against the fierce wind and the fear that had grabbed his heart with a metal fist, Arthur felt himself slam sideways into the glass pane of one of the windows. Tentatively, he opened his eyes. The harness had indeed broken and was now hanging uselessly against his hips. The rope attached to the harness however, was still in position and, after giving it an assessing tug, seemed stable enough to climb up.

He glanced through the window.

On the other side, wearing an expression of sheer shock and horror, a small boy of around five or six watched him in awe. Smirking slightly, Arthur winked back. Stunned, the boy leapt back from the window and ran out of the room, no doubt in search of his parents.

Arthur glanced down, then immediately wished he hadn't. Despite falling a few stories down, there was still a hell of a long way to go and, now with the tiny, matchbox, yellow taxis and amoeba-like people to wham everything into perspective, he felt a little queasy.

"Shit..." He murmured, feeling his stomach churning as his feet dangled limply beneath him, seemingly huge when compared to the street below. "Shitshitshitshit."

There was nothing else for it. Bracing his feet against the slippery masonry, Arthur pulled himself outwards, almost perpendicular to the building. Slowly, cautiously, with each agonizing step causing havoc in the muscles in his arms and legs, he began to scale the building, his face contorted with the effort.

Arthur pulled and climbed until he thought he might pass out. His fingers were numb, his legs were shaking and his arms felt like they were about to drop off, yet he knew he couldn't let go. Dying would be too easy; it's staying alive that's the hard part.

He glanced up. Two dark shaped were descending towards him, seeming to materialize from the mist.

"Arthur?"

"Are you ok?"

Eames and Ariadne. Thank Christ.

Ariadne arrived first, he face white with shock and fear.

"What happened? What the hell happened?"

Eames descended next, supporting Arthur under his arms. He grimaced as he felt his own harness creak with the effort of both his weight and Arthur's. It could hold out much longer.

"My harness snapped." Arthur panted, his breath ragged from the effort. He glanced down. He hadn't done badly, actually. He'd managed to climb at least three floors on his own, without a harness or even a helmet.

"We need to get in..." Eames muttered. "It can't hold out for much longer."

"Yeah..."

"We're not going to make it hauling you up between us; you weigh too much."

"Yeah, alright I get the picture..."

"I'm not saying you're fat, I just think we should be realistic here..."

"Eames!" Ariadne cut in, breaking him off. "You're not helping the situation."

"Ok. Sorry. It's just if Artie here were to lay off the pork pies for a bit, we could all be at the top by now."

"I don't think it had anything to do with me." Arthur murmured, fiddling with his harness. "I think someone tampered with it."

"Who?" Ariadne asked.

"I don't know...but Eames is right we need to get inside and..." He trailed off, watching Ariadne as she aimed her gun at the window and fired three times. Glass cascaded all around them and Eames nearly dropped Arthur in the confusion.

"Jesus Christ!" He yelled. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"Getting us inside!" Ariadne yelled. "Move!" Shinning quickly up her own rope, Ariadne climbed headfirst through the jagged hole that had once been a window. Arthur followed suit and, after brushing bits of glass off his shoulders, turned to give Eames a hand.

Ariadne inspected the room that lay out before her. It was a large meeting area, complete with long, oak table and around twenty chairs, all facing inwards. In the far corner of the room, next to the door was a drinks cabinet and a large grandfather clock. It was expensively furnished; the carpet was plush and bouncy under her feet.

"Right..." Eames began, having now climbed through the window, almost visibly bristling with anger. "Now that everyone in the whole entire BLOODY BUILDING knows we're here, we'll only have to wait about five seconds before we're shot through the head..."

"Calm down..." Arthur said, holding his hand up and stepping smartly between Eames and Ariadne.

"No I won't bloody calm down!" Eames snapped, swatting away Arthur's raised hand. "That was a stupid, stupid thing to do!"

"Maybe." Ariadne replied, calmly. "But it was the only option we had. If we didn't move fast, Arthur would have fallen and, as we're not yet dreaming, he would have stayed dead."

They were silent for a minute, Eames immediately regretting his outburst. Finally, Arthur bent down and picked up his rucksack, slinging it over one shoulder.

"C'mon." He said. "If we hang around too long we'll get caught. Someone's going to want to investigate that noise." Ariadne and Eames took the hint and followed suit, lugging their own backpacks onto their backs and following him towards the door.

"Quiet." Carefully, Arthur opened the door, checking both ways before stepping out into the deserted corridor. "We got lucky..." He murmured as they both followed him to the right. "...that might not happen again. We need to find the room."

Three days before, at roughly five-fifteen in the morning, Ariadne had received a phone call.

"Hello?" She had whispered blurrily into the receiver, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

"Ariadne. It's Arthur." Ariadne could just picture him now, looking uncrumpled and annoyingly awake in a crisp three piece suit, holding an expensive looking phone to his ear. "I need to speak to you. Eames and Yusuf too. I'll see you at the Warehouse at three. Got to go. See you then." And, without an apology for the early hour, he'd hung up. Bastard.

But then, she'd found it hard to stay angry at him after seeing him, looking as smart and dashing as ever, bent over a collection of documents she suspected were highly confidential and worth at least seven people's lives.

"Hi." She'd said, quietly. He turned, smiling and Ariadne felt like, for the first time in months, that she was where she belonged.

Yusuf and Eames had arrived shortly after and, after the kettle had been put on, Arthur explained to them why they'd been summoned.

"Roughly a month ago, coincidentally the same sort of time we finished Fischer's Inception, I had received this letter." Arthur slid a piece of paper the length of the table towards them.

Ariadne leant forward. It was written in a fancy script, with a red fountain pen.

_I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate you on your successful operation. Inception is by no means an easy feat and is a task that requires a great deal of skill and aptitude – qualities that seem to be abundant in both yourself and your team. It is for these reasons I have studied the progress you have been making over the last few weeks and have decided that I might be able to utilise your skills in a way that would be beneficial to both parties. _

_I am staying at the Grenway and Barnard's Hotel in New York. The Hotel is heavily guarded. You will need to be imaginative. Room 313. 27-9-10. Be there at eight._

_Impress me. _

_Your friend and admirer, _

_Mr X_

"I know it sounds dodgy..." Arthur said, running a hand through his hair. "...I just wanted to know what you think."

"How do they know?" Yusuf had gone pale.

"It could be a leak." Eames said, still staring at the letter.

"Possibly."

"Then why are you telling us? One of us could be a spy."

"Who else have I got?" They were quiet for a minute. "Look," Arthur said, taking the letter back off Eames as he spoke. "I guess what I'm really asking you is whether or not we should go..."

"Hell yes." Eames said. "I want some answers."

"I was hoping you'd say that..." Arthur smirked. "You in?"

"Absolutely. There's only so many women and champagne one can buy in the world before you start turning to nameless correspondents for entertainment."

Arthur turned to Yusuf.

"What do you say?" Yusuf looked awkward. Ariadne had a feeling she knew what he was going to say before he said it.

"I don't know. WE don't know enough about this Mr X guy. I think I'll stay here this time, sit this one out. Let me know what happens. If you need me, I'll go."

Arthur nodded.

"Okay. That's fine." He turned to Ariadne."What about you? Are you in?" He asked, his tone suddenly unsure. Ariadne thought for a moment.

"I mean..." She began. "...this is unbelievably stupid and reckless..."

"Unbelievably." Arthur agreed.

"...and will probably end up with us in jail..."

"Probably."

"I've seen enough guns to last a lifetime..."

"Fancy seeing some more?" Eames asked.

"God, yeah." She grinned. "I'll get my coat."

And so it was that she had found herself scaling the side of the Grenway & Barnar, watching Arthur nearly fall to his death and smash through a window into a meeting room.

Now, walking quickly behind Arthur with Eames bringing up the rear, she found herself almost trembling with excitement. She hadn't got a job, her degree was going down the pan and her parents were disappointed in her, yet never had she felt more alive. She smiled to herself. Life was good.

The room numbers slid past her.

"I think we're on the right floor..." Arthur murmured. "They all begin with three..."

313. The numbers jumped out at her from the wooden door.

"There!" She exclaimed, cutting across Eames. They stopped.

Checking the corridor was clear, Arthur pulled his gun out from under his jacket. Eames followed suit, retrieving his from his waistband. They both waited while Ariadne reloaded and knocked off the safety then, with a deafening crash, Arthur knocked the door down.

Sitting in the centre of the room, strapped to a chair with the flicker of a sniper laser on his forehead, was Yusuf. He was gagged, his eyes wide with panic.

Strapped to his chest was a note, written in the same red ink as the letter.

_Nobody refuses Mr X._

**A/N – I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of my first ever 'Inception' fanfiction. I do try my best and proofread, spellcheck and all that jazz but I am human (believe it or not) and so I do make mistakes. If you find any, I apologise and will correct them as quick as possible. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great. **

**Ashabagawa**


	2. Room Service

**A/N – Thanks for all the reviews, subscriptions and favourites. Your positive feedback really boosted my confidence!**

**I finished mapping out the plot for this story when I was waiting for my maths homework to load. Now I know what I'm doing, the plot should be a little tidier. This said, I am back at school now so updates may be slower. I'm sorry; I'll do my best. **

**I found the song 'Don't Take Your Love Away' by Vast really good for inspiration during the writing of this story. On YouTube, there's a really great Arthur/Ariadne fan video with it as the backing track. If you have a moment, I'd check it out. **

**That must be the longest Author's Note I've ever written. I'm sorry. I'll shut up now. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great – Ellen**

* * *

It took about two seconds and about five blinks for Yusuf to deduce that consciousness was not a nice place to be.

Someone was drilling a hole in his skull: something he objected to and, as he tried to swat them away, he became acutely aware that his arms were tied behind his back.

That was odd.

Bravely, he opened his eyes again and blinked against the harsh neon lights penetrating his heavy lids.

"Yusuf?" He heard his name. "Yusuf?" There it was again.

He tried turning his head. That hurt.

A streak of pain whipped across his face.

"Ouch..." He groaned.

"Did you have to slap him?" A woman's voice. American.

"He's awake." A man's voice. British.

Footsteps.

"Can you hear me, Yusuf?" Another male voice. American. It was Arthur and Eames. Ariadne was there too, a blurry patch near the door.

"Yes..." His own voice was croaky and dry. He tried to focus on the two large blotches in front of him, although his head hurt too much. He swallowed. "I can hear you."

"He's still out of it..." Eames murmured, untying his hands and feet from the wooden chair. "Whatever they gave him must have been strong stuff."

"I feel like I've been hit by a bus." Yusuf choked.

"Like I said...strong stuff."Eames frowned. "Who the hell is this guy, Arthur? How can he know all these things about us? How did he know Yusuf said 'no'?" Arthur was silent for a moment before finally speaking.

"I don't know..." He said, his voice unnervingly quiet. "...and that's the scary part."

* * *

It was Arthur's idea to search the room. Eames thought it was hopeless: someone who could listen in on the conversations monitored by quite possibly the most paranoid Point Man of all time, wasn't about to go and leave secret mission files around in an unlocked hotel room.

Arthur said it was worth a shot.

He seemed to say that a lot, thought Ariadne as she slammed the drawer of the bedside cabinet, perhaps a little too forcefully. You could do absolutely anything if that was your argument. Go around kissing bewildered architects, for example.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door. They all froze, staring at each other. Simultaneously, they all drew their weapons, moving slowly towards the door. It was Eames that opened it.

There was nobody there.

Instead, staring up at them from the plush carpet, was a postcard. It was from the hotel, and sported the huge Grenway and Barnard logo, a lion holding a sceptre. It wasn't this, however, that interested them.

Written on the crisp, thick paper, was another note, in the same, red ink.

_Your Mark has just arrived. He'll be at dinner, 7:30pm, table 17. There's one seat free._

_The sedatives and PASIV will come with room service._

_Mr X_

"Shit." Eames muttered, turning the postcard over in his hands. "We are up to our ears in shit."

"I've noticed..." Arthur replied, having read the note over his shoulder.

"Hang on..." Ariadne snatched the postcard off Eames and examined it closely. "I know this writing..."

"Whose is it?" Arthur asked, urgently.

"I don't know..." She murmured. "I just feel like I've seen it somewhere before..."

Another knock at the door.

They drew their weapons again, almost a reflex action by now and, as Eames opened the door again, Ariadne had to stop her finger twitching involuntarily out of shock.

Standing in the doorway, clutching a laundry trolley, was a maid. It was not the trolley that Ariadne found surprising, however. She was too busy taking in the bomb that was strapped to the poor girl's chest and the look of fear that seemed to scream out of her deep blue eyes.

The maid's hands were shaking.

"I've found a new way of communicating..." The girl said, her voice tinny and trembling, her words obviously not her own. "...The great thing about being invisible is that you can use other people's mouths." She suddenly started to sob, her shoulders shaking with terror.

As she moved, Arthur noticed the discrete black earpiece jutting out of her earlobe. That must have been how she knew what to say...

The girl had now recovered slightly and, although still hysterical, was able to speak again.

"Find the Mark and knock him out, using one of these sedatives." She extended her arm. Clutched in her sweaty palm were four vials of golden liquid. "Bring him back here and connect him to the PASIV. When you're ready, take your own sedative. It should take you up to three levels. Oh, and just to make sure you fulfil your side of the bargain, the bomb strapped to this lovely young girl will start to count down as soon as you've taken the sedative. You have three hours before it goes off, killing everyone in the hotel. Get back in time and you can disarm it..." She stopped, her lower lip trembling, obviously receiving more instructions. "You're dinner date's in five minutes..." She said, her eyes brimming with tears. "Don't be late."

* * *

They had decided Arthur would go. As the most experienced and less likely to make a stupid mistake, he had volunteered himself and now found himself in a lift, along with a young couple who were blissfully unaware that their lives were in the hands of the young man they were sharing the cramped space with.

He was scared. Terrified, actually. He couldn't remember ever being quite so terrified in all his life. They were completely in the hands of this 'Mr X' and Arthur couldn't think of any way out. For what must have been the fiftieth time, he checked his gun was tucked into his waistband. It was loaded; he could tell from the way it was pressing into his back and he knew that, if pushed, he could retrieve it in around 2.456 seconds and pull the trigger less than 1.54 seconds later. An accurate shot was 98% probable although, in his current mental state, this wasn't definite.

The lift had reached the ground floor. After taking a deep breath, he followed the couple out into the restaurant of the hotel.

It was certainly swanky, with huge arrangements of roses and lilies cascading out of display pots around the neatly arranged tables. Chandeliers adorned the ceiling, dripping diamonds over the assembled diners. There were a great many of them too, all dressed in pristine tuxedos and evening dresses, laughing and smiling elegantly.

They did not interest Arthur however as, sitting at table seventeen, was Dominic Cobb.


	3. Old Friends

**A/N – Thanks again for all the encouragement and kind words! This must be my record speed for an update! (My teachers were uncharacteristically nice today and didn't give me any homework :D) I hope you like this chapter and that Cobb is in character; I'm worried he won't be. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great – Ellen**

A strange cocktail of alarm, panic and guilt stabbed Arthur through the heart as he neared table seventeen, drawing ever nearer to Cobb's sandy head, bent over the Evening News. What did Mr X want with Cobb? Surely as soon as Arthur started talking to him he'd realise something was wrong... Could he betray his best friend?

Suddenly, the maid's terrified, brown eyes filled his mind, accompanied with images of the hotel disappearing into a ball of fire and ash. Roughly how many people would die if he resisted? Cobb might mean a lot to him, but surely he'd understand if it meant saving the lives of hundreds of people, not to mention themselves - that was what he was telling himself, anyway.

"Fancy seeing you here..." The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. Cobb stiffened before looking up.

"Arthur?" His face was a mixture of both pleasure and confusion. "What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same thing." Smiling and, without waiting for an invitation, Arthur sat down. "Although..." he looked his friend up and down. "...judging by your attire, I'd say you're not working." Cobb was wearing a casual shirt, rolled up at the sleeves and a pair of dark brown corduroy trousers. Cobb smiled.

"You're right." He said, raising an eyebrow. "I'm here with Miles and the kids. Miles has taken them to see a film. Something animated to do with dinosaurs..." he trailed off. "What about you, though? What brings you to New York?" Arthur's brain went blank. Still maintaining his poker face, he waved a hand vaguely.

"Working. Nothing interesting, though." Something flashed behind Cobb's piercing blue eyes.

"C'mon, Arthur." He smiled. "Work's always interesting." Arthur smirked.

"Not this kind," He replied, twiddling an empty wine glass between his fingers. "It's just research."

"Oh." He'd played his cards right; Cobb had always hated research. "Are you going to eat anything?" Cobb asked, indicating towards the menu.

"No, thanks. I already ate." This was a lie but, due to the current state of Arthur's stomach, he didn't feel he could stomach even the rarest piece of rump steak.

"You don't mind if I..." Cobb waved the menu vaguely.

"Not at all." A waiter arrived a moment later, carrying a glass of sherry. He placed it on the table before looking enquiringly at Arthur.

"Anything for you, sir?"

"No, thanks."

Cobb placed his order and, in a flurry of hair oil and cologne, the waiter left, leaving the two men alone again.

Arthur eyed the sherry. It was a dark, almost purple, red and, as it swilled in the glass, it seemed to be beckoning to Arthur; an obvious way to apply the sedative. Arthur looked back up at Cobb.

He was staring at him, his blue eyes seeming to find their way to his soul. A silly part of Arthur wondered if he already knew.

"You alright, Arthur?" He asked. "You seem a bit..." He trailed off, having obviously no words for the way his friend was behaving. Arthur didn't blame him.

"Yeah...fine." He smiled back, his fingers closing around the cool glass of the vial in his pocket. "Is that Miles there?"

"Where?" Cobb turned and, in the split second that followed, Arthur reached over the table and poured the liquid into his drink, nearly knocking the salt and pepper to the floor in the process. "I don't see Miles..."

"No?" Arthur transferred his hands back inside his pockets. They were shaking violently. "It must back been someone else..." Cobb turned.

"Are you sure you're ok, buddy?" He frowned. "You're sort of jumpy."

"I'm just...stressed." Arthur smiled, as if admitting to a great secret. Cobb rolled his eyes.

"For the last time, you need to trust someone else with some responsibility," In one, heart-stopping second, Cobb took a sip from his sherry. Arthur could see the effects as soon as it had hit his lips. "You need to..." Cobb trailed off for a second, blinking confusedly. "I feel...like..." He looked up, his eyes fixing with Arthur's. The smile was gone. "What have you done?" He asked slowly, his words measured and laboured, obviously a great effort to utter. "You..." Cobb pointed to the empty sherry glass, his eyelids drooping.

Arthur nodded.

"Why?" Cobb asked, hurt and disappointment etched all over his face.

"I'm sorry." Arthur whispered, his voice thick with emotion.

Cobb fought the sedative for about two seconds longer, before collapsing heavily into his chair.

The journey to room 313 had been a tricky one, not least because Cobb's weight was completely dead.

Arthur had carried him over his shoulders out of the restaurant and into the lift after explaining to the harassed-looking Head Waiter that he was Cobb's friend and that he was going to take him upstairs to his room where he could lie down.

Eames had opened the door and after taking one look at Cobb had sworn so profusely that Arthur was sure he would never hear in quite the same was again.

"Oh my god..." Ariadne gushed, once Arthur and Yusuf had laid Cobb's unconscious form onto the bed. "What does Mr X want with Cobb?"

"I dunno..." Arthur replied, running a hand through his hair. "...but it doesn't matter now. We have hundreds of lives in our hands. We have to do what we're told..."

He glanced over at the maid who, courtesy of Ariadne, was now clutching a mug of hot tea but looked no less terrified. The fear of imminent death can do that to a person.

"Her name's Hannah..." Ariadne whispered. "...that's all I can get out of her."

"It'll be ok, sweetheart." Eames moved over to her, his voice uncharacteristically soothing and kind. He bent down and rested a palm on her knee. "We won't let anything happen to you."

She looked at him for a minute and spoke for the first time with words of her own choosing.

"You people can control people's dreams?" Her voice was quiet, shaking.

"Not exactly." Arthur replied. "We can manipulate them, based on knowledge obtained previously. Subconscious dreaming is very different to the illusion we create. We tend to..."

"Oh, shut up!" Eames barked. Arthur looked affronted. "She wants comfort, not a science lesson." He turned back to her, his stern face gone. "Yes, we can control dreams." He said. "And I promise you, I'm going to get this sick bastard if it's the last thing I do." He smiled. "Do you know what to do with the PASIV?"

Hannah nodded. She got up and moved over to her abandoned trolley, now standing at the foot of the bed. She pushed the towels aside to expose a silver box, breathtakingly familiar. She set it up at the foot of the bed.

"You're ready to go." She said, her voice wavering slightly. Arthur turned to Ariadne.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" He asked her. "We have no idea what's going to be waiting for us. Cobb's the best guy out there; he's protected. It'll be..."

"...like walking into a minefield." She finished his sentence for him, her face grim and set. "I know what I want, Arthur." She said. "I'm coming with you." Arthur nodded, he knew she'd say this.

"Ok."

Yusuf connected the IV to Cobb's arm. He then injected into his own bloodstream, settling down into an armchair before his body went limp. Ariadne went next, lying down on the orange rug before connecting herself to the PASIV. After a few moments, she too went limp.

Then it was just Arthur and Eames.

Grimly, Arthur thrust the needle into his arm, watching with distaste as Eames did the same.

"See you on the other side?" That earned him a curt nod.

Arthur leaned backwards into the cold metal of the chair, slipping into the blackness, but not before noticing the harsh red numbers now flickering on the display board strapped to Hannah's chest.

03:00

02:59

02:58


	4. The Other Side

**A/N – Thank you for all your feedback. I found this chapter particularly hard to write. I hope it's OK. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

Arthur had never particularly liked the sea. Even when he was little, the idea of getting your feet all gummed up with wet, sticky sand had never seemed that appealing and, now, with the fierce waves soaking every inch of him, he realised he liked the seaside even less.

It was dark. Dark and cold. His eyes, stinging with the salt of the waves, adjusted to the darkness and he found himself floating only a few feet away from what seemed to be a large, jagged rock, atop which stood a formidable looking lighthouse, its beam cutting like a razor through the heavy blanket of the night sky. He kicked his feet through the freezing water and grabbed onto the sharp edges of the lethal-looking barnacle-encrusted crag.

He pulled himself up, his muscles straining against the extra weight of his water-clogged clothes. His feet scrabbled on the uneven surface before finally catching a foothold. When he was finally upright, he glanced down at himself. Oh dear. That was another thing. Every inch of Italian, couture three-piece suit was soaked, sticking like cling-film to his shivering body – seemingly intent on freezing him even more thoroughly. He swore, his breath shaking from behind his chattering teeth.

Where the hell was he? Cobb's dream would no doubt be infested with all manner of dangerous paradoxes and murderous subconscious projections.

The little Lighthouse Island was completely surrounded by ocean. There was no hint of any mainland against the inky blackness of the horizon, no hint of any causeway within the fierce roaring of the ocean. The lighthouse was the only place to go.

As he moved forwards, his feet tripping on the uneven rock face and sliding about in their wet leather brogues, he caught a glimpse of a shape looming from behind a lumps of craggy rock. In an instant, he had removed his gun from the waistband of his trousers and had planted it firmly in the palm of his hand, aiming it sharply at the dark shape ahead of him.

The shape stumbled and tripped over the surface of the rock, getting larger with every step. Soon enough however, Arthur recognised the shape of the soaking brown corduroy jacket and the steady stream of profanity escalading out of the figure's mouth and into the night air.

"...couldn't have imagined a bloody _spa_, could he? Oh no. Has to be a sodding _lighthouse_ in the middle of bloody _nowhere_ where it's pissing down..."

"Eames!" His voice rang out, echoing off the uneven faces of the rock. Eames looked up.

"Have you seen the others yet?" He asked, running a hand through his soaking hair. "I'm bloody freezing."

"No. You're the first one I've seen. It must have been because we were last to connect."

"Yeah. I bet it's just my luck that the others ended up inside while we had to swim...bastards."

Slowly, they picked their way across the rugged terrain, always on edge, searching for any hint of a projection.

"Don't you think this is a bit weird?" Eames asked, almost falling on his face in the process. "The fact that no one's tried to kill us yet, besides the sea of course."

"Yeah..." Arthur replied, giving Eames a hand up a particularly steep rock. "I don't expect it to last though."

"No..." Eames agreed. "Though I'll be a lot happier once I know who it is that's trying to kill me."

They finally arrived at the door to the lighthouse about ten minutes later, having had to negotiate a particularly tricky and life-threatening group of rocks.

"Do we just go in?" Eames asked.

"I think so..." Arthur replied thoughtfully. "Cobb's in a dream; he won't remember yet that I've betrayed him. If we can fool him into thinking he can trust us, we can try to extract whatever it is that Mr X wants..."

"I don't like this..." Eames said, his tone uncharacteristically morbid.

"Neither do I," Arthur said, turning round to fix Eames with look that could have made even a blind man stop in his tracks. "But we have no choice."

* * *

Ariadne blinked, only to find herself blinded by quite possibly the brightest light she had ever encountered in her life. She clamped her eyes shut, covering them protectively with her arms. The image of the bright bulb remained burned into her eyelids, no matter how many times she tried to blink them away.

She could hear the sea. It was loud, fierce, exploding into her senses. She turned round. Rain hammered down against the window pane. She could see the sea now her vision had cleared. It was rough, choppy, attacking the rocks beneath her. That meant she was high up.

The light came from behind her this time. It was just as bright, although this time she knew to shut her eyes.

She was at the top of a lighthouse. The bulb was behind her and, tempting though it was, she refused to turn around to look at it, as she knew her eyes would burn again.

Where was Arthur? Where was Eames, Yusuf and Cobb?

She walked the circumference of the tower before finding a spiral staircase, almost directly beneath the bulb itself. Scrunching her eyes up, she slowly descended the first few steps, scrabbling at the banister in order to keep herself steady. When she'd descended a fair way, she braved opening her eyes a fraction, bracing herself for the brightness.

There was no need, however; she was now underneath the bulb, its glare filtered slightly by the damp floorboards overhead, only cracks of light penetrating the darkness through the gaps in the wood.

She found herself at the very top of a winding staircase, descending into the darkness. She wondered if there even was a bottom. Carefully, minding her footing on the slippery metal steps, she started to climb down. After all, there was only one way to go.

She hoped she'd find Arthur or Eames first. They were more likely to know what they were doing then Yusuf, and Cobb would be dangerous to deal with on her own; who knew what was going on through his mind right now. She wouldn't know what to say to him.

But then, as if someone had overheard her frantic thinking, Cobb's sandy head appeared around the axel of the staircase, coming in the opposite direction. Ariadne remained frozen, like a deer in headlights, on the stairs.

He looked up and saw her, his blue eyes flashing with incomprehension.

"Ariadne?" He asked, his voice echoing in the dark.

"Cobb?" She replied, deciding to play the innocent.

"Why are you here?" He asked, looking her up and down.

"We're on a job, remember?" Ariadne lied, thinking quickly on her feet. Cobb looked at her blankly. "Oh no," she sighed. "Yusuf must have made the calculations wrong with your sedative; you've forgotten everything." She climbed down the remaining steps between them, until she was standing next to him. "We need to find Arthur," she said, this time telling the truth. "He'll know what to do."

Cobb nodded, still confused.

They climbed further down together, their feet rapping on the slippery metal, echoing into the darkness. They found Yusuf on the way, crouched against the banister, clutching another PASIV.

"I woke up with it in my hands," he said, "I think we're supposed to use it."

Together, they continued to climb down, their footsteps now accompanied by the clanging of the metal of the case against the metal of the stairs.

Suddenly, the sound of creaking wood echoed through the dark lighthouse and, peering over the edge of the banister, Ariadne could just make out the vague shape of two silhouettes standing in the doorway.

"Arthur?" She called. "Eames? Is that you?"

"Yeah!" Arthur's reply echoed back, as if there were several Arthurs all around her. "We'll start climbing up to you!"

Arthur and Eames started to climb. Ariadne could hear their footsteps clanging on the damp metal. And yet, after several minutes, they hadn't appeared yet.

"Hello?" She called, hanging over the banister again. "Where are you?"

"We're coming." Eames this time.

"We'll meet you." Grabbing Cobb by the sleeve of his jacket and beckoning for Yusuf to follow her, Ariadne started to climb down.

Five minutes later, they hadn't met yet.

"It's a paradox..." Arthur murmured. "It's a trap."

"STOP!" Eames yelled. The footsteps above them ceased.

"What?" Ariadne's head appeared over the edge of the banister again.

"It's a paradox. Look." Bending down, Arthur unlaced his shoe and dropped it over the edge of the staircase. It crashed with a clang onto the level below where he and Eames were standing. Arthur continued to walk up the staircase, only to appear a couple of seconds later from below where Eames still stood. Arthur held up the shoe he'd dropped less than a minute earlier. "It's the Penrose Steps," He said, putting his shoe back on. "We can't get to you and you can't get to us."

"I'll have to build a new staircase," Ariadne replied. "Hang on."

As they all looked on in wonder, a new staircase began to form, jutting out from where Cobb, Ariadne and Yusuf were standing, missing a layer, before falling to rest just in front of Arthur and Eames.

Exchanging a look of bewilderment, Arthur and Eames started to climb the new staircase.

This time, it only took a minute.

"What happened to you?" Cobb asked, taking in Arthur and Eames' soaked attire.

"We fancied a swim." Eames replied, sending Cobb a withering look. "The thing I don't get," he said, glancing around at the mouldy, damp walls of the lighthouse. "Is why no one's tried to kill us yet."

Of course, that was when all hell broke loose.

Thunder burst its way through all of Arthur's senses, shaking the staircase from the brackets holding it to the walls. They all crashed into one another, as the staircase shook and a stretch of lightning forked through the hole in the roof.

"The storm!" Arthur yelled. "That's his subconscious! You can't kill a storm!"

Roof tiles were frantically being dragged off by the wind, leaving more and more of the tower exposed to the elements. The bulb had fallen from the very top of the building and now lay smashed below them. More of the wall was ripped apart and, as it crumbled down the edge of the rock, they could see what was causing all the disruption. Less than ten metres away, a huge tornado was spiralling up into the chaotic dark sky, spinning dangerously, causing destruction everywhere it veered.

"We have to get down!" Arthur yelled. "We need to find shelter!"

It was as these words left his mouth, snatched away by the wind, that the banister against which he had been leaning fell away and, as helpless as a leaf snagged by the Autumn breeze, Arthur fell with it.

His arms pedalled, his legs clawing at the air. Two fatal falls in one day, he thought stupidly as Ariadne's screams were ripped away from her throat. That had to be some sort of record.

Arthur hit the concrete floor at the bottom of the swinging staircase with an awful crunch, his body battered and broken like a spineless rag doll.


	5. Trust Me

**A/N – Two updates in a day! This must be a record! **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

Ariadne didn't even know she was crying until she needed to breathe for air, her sobs making her breath gasping and unreliable.

She couldn't believe it. Yet there he was, crumpled and broken beneath her.

"Move!" It was Eames that had recovered first. Grabbing her by the back of her jacket, he pushed her back away from the edge and towards the stairs, pulling her after him as they all hurried down, slipping and sliding in panic.

Cobb reached the bottom first. He ran quickly over the concrete floor, his eyes squinting against the cruel wind and rain before finally reaching the spot where Arthur lay against the rubble of what had been one of the walls.

He looked worse up close. His eyes were shut and a small trickle of blood was leaking out from the corner of his mouth. His arm and legs were splayed out in a star shape, his left leg bent at an unnatural angle – almost bent back on itself.

Cobb crouched quickly and removed the still soaking jacket clinging to Arthur's chest. Placing two fingers steadily across his friend's neck, Cobb closed his eyes, hoping, praying for a pulse. Finally, Cobb felt a small movement against his fingertips and, after prodding harder against the soft flesh, could barely contain his sigh of relief as he realised that, although unconscious and in no fit state to do anything apart from lie still, his friend was still alive.

"He's over here!" He yelled, his voice battling against the wind. "He's alive!"

Ariadne felt her heart soar. Arthur was alive. Hurt, but alive. Wrestling herself free of Eames' protective hand, she hurtled across the concrete before crouching next to Cobb, still sobbing.

"Will he be ok?" She asked, tears rolling freely down her face.

"I honestly don't know." Cobb replied, staring down at his unconscious friend. "Who knows where you go when you're knocked unconscious when you're already unconscious."

Ariadne stared down at Arthur's face. His hair was rumpled and wavy with the moisture: very un-Arthur like. Still crying, she wiped the trickle of blood away from the corner of his mouth, before taking off her own damp jacket and using it as a pillow underneath his head.

She felt a hand on her shoulder. Eames was looking down at her, his face a grim attempt at comfort.

"He'll be alright." He said, his voice was soft – the same tone he'd used with Hannah in the hotel room. "It'll take more than a tornado to get rid of Arthur." Ariadne tried to smile back, although her efforts were ruined slightly by the tears streaming from her eyes; she seemed unable to stop them.

"Speaking of which..." Yusuf was facing away from them, pointing at the tornado, looming ever nearer.

"What do we do?" Ariadne murmured to Eames – Cobb seemed intent on the tornado.

"Go up a level." He replied, in an equally stealthy tone. "We'll have to trick him into extracting from his own mind." Ariadne frowned.

"And how do we do that exactly?" She asked.

"We pretend it's a job." He turned towards Cobb. "We've established the subconscious isn't personified – it's in the elements, things that can't be destroyed. This makes life tricky for us as we still have absolutely no idea what could be waiting on the next level, but what we do know is that it'll be dangerous and we won't be able to kill it." He frowned. "We'll need someone to stay here and look after Arthur."

"I'll do it." It was Yusuf that spoke, almost immediately.

"Ok." Eames nodded. "Hook us up."

Cobb frowned. "Wait a second," he said, fixing Eames with a calculating look. Ariadne felt her stomach lurch; if Cobb worked out what was really going on here, there was no telling what sort of natural disasters would happen next. "What exactly are we looking for? Who's the mark?"

"The mark's been taken care of. We just need to find the safe." Luckily, Eames seemed to be on the ball.

"What do you mean 'the mark's been taken care of'?" Cobb asked, suspicion still lurking in his tone. Eames sighed, glancing at Arthur's unconscious form.

"Arthur took care of it," he said finally, fixing Cobb with an earnest look – a look that nearly broke Ariadne's heart. "You just have to trust him." The words seemed to ring in her ears, long after Eames had said them. That was exactly the thing; Cobb couldn't trust them, would never trust them again after this. This was going to be her last job. Arthur must have known this. Arthur would be destroyed without dreams.

Almost without thinking, she reached out, taking Arthur's clammy, cold hand in her own and held it tenderly to her chest.

Cobb had been watching her. He nodded.

"Yes," he said, turning back to Eames. "I trust you." Something flickered behind Eames' eyes and, for a moment, Ariadne wondered if he was feeling the same thing as her: an almost unbearable sense of guilt.

"Ok," he said, turning to Yusuf. "Hook us up."

Cobb lay back on the pebbles, resting his head on the rocks. He went first and soon his body went limp.

"How could you say that?" Ariadne immediately rounded on Eames. "How could you say those things knowing what we've done?"

"There was no other way," he replied, staring sadly at Cobb's sleeping form. All anger Ariadne had previously felt evaporated and she hung her head, immediately ashamed.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It's not your fault." Eames looked at her oddly.

"You're a great architect," he said awkwardly. "But you know that, don't you?" She narrowed her eyes at him.

"What do you mean?" She asked.

"Earlier...when you bashed in the window with your gun," he stuttered. "Look," he said. "You know this is my way of apologising for being an arse, don't you?"

"Yeah. Call it even?"

"Yeah." They were silent for a minute, staring at the bodies of their fallen comrades. "Well," Eames said after a minute. "Let's get this show on the road." He leant back and, with one last smile, was asleep, smiling in his unconsciousness.

Yusuf crouched down next to Ariadne.

"I'll look after him," he said, nodding towards the unconscious Point Man. She nodded, her vision blurry with tears again.

"Thank you," she said, before settling on the pebbles, next to Arthur and succumbing to the blackness too.


	6. Nostalgia of the Worst Kind

**A/N – I have to say, I'm not sure about this chapter. It took me several rewrites. I hope it's OK. Thanks for all the reviews. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

Eames could still remember the first time he'd ever been to a Carnival.

It had been December and the grass, crunchy with frost and fragments of discarded toffee popcorn, had crinkled satisfyingly under the soles of his big brown boots. He was only eight years old, so his feet probably hadn't been that big, but they'd seen horrifically out of proportion at the time.

It was his father that had taken him. It had been one of those rare Saturday night excursions between father and son, each becoming shorter and more far apart as time went by. It hadn't been fun living in Divorce City.

Now, picking himself up from the muddy ground, he could still picture his father's face in his mind, laughing as they each had a turn on the merry-go-round. He hadn't spoken to him in over seven years. He now wondered if he would ever have the chance to again.

The reason for this sudden trip into the comforting realms of nostalgia was that, judging by the streams of ragged, dirty bunting drooping half-heartedly across the muddy pathway and the hollowed out shell of what once seemed to have been a Ferris Wheel, the recesses of Cobb's mind had conjured up a deserted fairground.

Fog hung damply in the air, coating his tongue with the sticky taste of mouldy candyfloss and congealed toffee apples. Striped tents, murky and fraying at the seams, crouched like weary travellers throughout the damp, misty field. A Punch and Judy Show Theatre was leaning, lopsided and wonky, against a pony trap, also lopsided and wonky.

A noise to his left.

He turned, drawing his gun. Of course, if this was Cobb's subconscious, they'd already established the fact that a gun would have absolutely no effect on it; you couldn't shoot the weather. That was another thing – he had absolutely no idea how to defend himself. Always one step ahead of the game, Cobb had somehow managed to control his subconscious, sculpting it into a more effective defence mechanism than men with guns. The first level had been an electric storm. What would be next? Cobb had been aware of the risks of extraction, so he'd programmed his mind to destroy unwanted viruses and there they all were, unwanted viruses, plodding happily into a death trap.

Luckily it wasn't Cobb's subconscious. It was the man himself. Beside him, looking increasingly nervous, was Ariadne. Cobb nodded once.

It had been hard earlier, saying what he'd said. He knew he was a forger – it was his job to say things he didn't mean – yet it still hurt, deep inside. Cobb was his friend, colleague, a man he felt he could trust. Now he knew Cobb would never trust him again, probably never speak to him again. He would lose him forever.

"We're looking for a safe, huh?" Cobb called, the sound tinny and strange in the mist.

"Yeah," Eames nodded. "Or something similar. Shouldn't be too difficult..." If they found a safe, they'd be delving into the depths of Cobb's own mind – something Eames wasn't too keen on doing.

They slowly picked their way across the abandoned carnival site, occasionally ducking into tents. They were nearly all the same; completely gutted apart from the skeleton of rust encrusted poles and flaps of mould canvas. There was never anything interesting.

Suddenly, the floor fell away. Ariadne screamed, lurching forward until both Cobb and Eames grabbed an arm each, pulling her away from the gaping hole. As they watched, the floor caved in dragging tents and caravans with it – even the merry-go-round fell into the gap, falling with an ear splitting screech into the void, now at least five hundred metres deep. At the very bottom, Ariadne could see the canvas and twisted metal, curdled and trampled in the mud below her. It reminded her of how Arthur had looked lying, fragile and broken on the concrete at the bottom of the stairs and she hastily looked up, calculating the width of the gap.

"A trap door..." Cobb murmured, also glancing across the void. "Very clever."

"I need to build a bridge," Ariadne said, turning to Eames.

"Let's think about this a minute," he said, raising an eyebrow. "The last time you altered a dream, we ended up being chased by a dirty great tornado and we all know how well that ended..." He trailed off, his meaning clear. Blinking away yet another horrifying image of Arthur's broken body, Ariadne nodded.

"You're right," she said. "We need to think about this." Cobb however, remained pensive.

"He protects himself using tornados," he mumbled. "He knows how to place trapdoors, he knows how to create paradoxes." He turned to Eames. "You lied," he said, the two simple words cutting like a dagger through Eames' stomach. "This guy knows about dreams. This isn't going to be easy. Why did you lie?" His tone was quiet, deadly calculating. Eames could feel himself sweating.

"I didn't know," his voice was shaky, unconvincing. "Arthur told me it would be easy." Ariadne felt herself boil; she didn't like the way he was pinning this all on Arthur.

"That's not like him," Cobb said, eyes still narrowed at Eames. Eames shrugged.

"He's your friend," he said. They both knew this wasn't true. Despite the banter and constant jibes, Eames and Arthur did like each other. Actually that was probably going a bit far; they had established a sort of grudging respect for each other.

Cobb continued to stare at Eames, his gaze unfaltering.

"What's going on?" he asked suddenly. "This isn't like you, like any of you. Arthur was different when he..." He trailed off, his eyes clouded.

"When Arthur what?" Ariadne asked, her voice suddenly high with panic. Eames could feel himself sweating again. Cobb looked up, an expression of pure horror on his features.

"He...we were in a hotel...there was sherry..." Cobb mumbled. Eames felt his blood run cold. Cobb shook his head. "I can't remember," he said.

"It's ok," Eames said, perhaps a little too quickly. "We'll worry about it later. We need to focus on getting across here..." He gestured towards the void, seemingly larger than it was a minute ago.

"We have no option," Ariadne said, glad of the change of subject. "I'll have to build a bridge if we're going to find the safe." Cobb remained silent.

She turned back to the void.

Slowly, as if appearing out of the ground itself, concrete and steel sprouted out of the dust, from both sides of the void, meeting in the middle as two complete halves of a sturdy-looking metallic bridge. It was as the concrete set, fixing itself onto the floor, that things started to go wrong.

"My throat," Eames suddenly remarked. "It feels really dry." Sure enough, the air itself seemed crisper, harsher and it was only as the first few tinges of smoke started to issue from the broken structure of the merry-go-round below that Ariadne realised what was happening.

"FIRE!" She yelled, grabbing both Cobb and Eames by the sleeves of their jackets and pulling them across the bridge, wincing as the steel beneath her feet began to heat up with the newborn flames.

They finally reached the other side and turned, gasping to watch Cobb's mind burn, the tortuous flames getting ever nearer in an ugly blaze of oranges and reds.

* * *

The Boy From Nowhere was enjoying the feeling of swinging, the jolt as his momentum caught up with him, the thrill as his stomach caught up with the rest of his body as the metal chains swung downwards, bringing him forcefully back down to Earth. The Boy liked it here. Here there was Nothing, no details to learn, no facts to relate. Just the swing and The Boy and the Nothingness. Alone. It was nice.

The Boy grinned, his skin pale against the darkness of his hair. The Boy From Nowhere would have liked to have stayed here forever, he thought.

But then he wasn't alone. What had before been another patch of Nothingness, indistinguishable from the next, was now another swing, with another swinger.

It was a girl, he realised. She had large eyes, with eyelashes like spider's feet, he thought. They were long and spindly. They must be irritating, he thought. He wouldn't like to have eyes with spider's feet hanging off them. Her hair was dark too, tangled and wavy, falling just short of her shoulders. She looked seven, about his own age and, as she smiled his way, he smiled back too – suddenly glad of a companion among the Nothing.

"Hello," he said, finding his voice; he hadn't used it before. "My name is Arthur." He said this because he knew it to be true, the same way he knew that if he kicked off the ground with his feet, he'd always find a way back.

The girl smiled.

"Hello," she said. Her voice was different somehow. More musical and laboured. "My name is Mal."


	7. The Man Without a Shadow

**A/N – Thanks for all feedback. Feedback is wonderful, as always. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great – Ellen **

* * *

The fire had spread quickly, devouring the remnants of the carnival in its wake. Tents, alight and burning with flame, fell haphazardly into the gaping hole in the floor.

Eames had always thought that flames were pretty. Candles, fireplaces and flaming torches all conjured up images of comfort and warmth. These flames were anything but comforting. They seemed almost like liquid - as if poured onto the ground – and their colour was acidic, too brilliant to be natural. Heat radiated off them and Eames could almost feel the air around him crackling, breaking in the dryness.

It was only a matter of time before the flames reached them. They were cocooned in the shelter of a large tent, coughing and spluttering as the smoke slowly inched closer.

"You have to go up another level," Eames coughed, his breath rough and ragged.

"Why?" Ariadne asked, her voice also scratchy.

"It'll buy you some time." Ariadne couldn't help noticing that he'd said 'you', not 'we'. "Time is relative," he reminded her. "You'll have more time in the next level than you will here; you could be back in seconds." Ariadne knew this was a slight exaggeration but she let it slide. She nodded.

"I'll have to make a PASIV," she said. Eames nodded. Slowly, the silver case appeared in front of her. It was cold; a breath of fresh air to her fingertips, dry and cracked in the unforgiving altitude.

Outside, a tent exploded.

"It's going to get worse," Cobb said. "Hurry up!" He connected the IV to his arm and in a minute was asleep, slumped on the floor.

"Remember, we're looking for a safe," Eames explained, helping Ariadne with hers. "I'll hold the fort down here. He patted her arm. "Look after him." He nodded over to Cobb's unconscious body, limp on the dirty floor.

"I will."

"Good luck."

She shut her eyes and descended into darkness.

* * *

Yusuf grabbed onto the rock face, grasping anything that may anchor him to the ground. He'd done quite well so far, he thought. He'd managed to drag the bodies of his teammates behind a particularly large boulder, thereby shielding them from the brunt of the wind and rain. They'd only left a few minutes ago, yet already it felt like a lifetime.

Then everything changed as a Browning automatic pistol was shoved into the back of his neck.

He turned, slowly.

The barrel of the gun, a pair of cruel, grey eyes.

"You," he breathed, fear and repulsion building like phlegm inside his mouth.

The gun was fired, the bullet slamming into his forehead. Then, everything was black.

* * *

The Girl Named Mal was no longer swinging and nor was Arthur.

Instead, they were now sitting in a field full of daisies. It was a strange place; the sky seemed to go on forever, never meeting the grass that was now swaying in the whisper of a breeze that haunted the stillness of the air. Spread out before them on the yellowing grass was a picnic blanket – red and chequered – with a scattering of goods on plastic white plates.

Arthur bit into an apple. He couldn't taste the juice. He could feel it, sliding down his tongue and dripping from his lips, yet the taste wouldn't penetrate. It was as there was a film between the soft flesh of the fruit and his mouth – protection him from it, as if it was poisonous.

"It's strange, isn't it?" He looked up and found Mal smiling at him, her spidery-lashed eyes large and friendly. He nodded.

"Why can't I taste it?" He asked, turning the apple over in his hands, as if expecting the answer to be written somewhere on its skin. Mal cocked her head to the side, her dark hair curling around her oval face.

"You don't belong here, Arthur," she said, still smiling; as if this was good news.

"And where exactly is 'here'?" he asked, looking around for what must have been the twentieth time.

"Death," she said, as if telling him the weather. A stab of panic rose in his chest, welling up until he felt as though it might suffocate him.

"Death?" He exclaimed, the apple lying forgotten on the yellowing grass. "I can't be dead I..." Memories seemed to flood his mind, as if a dam somewhere within his head had suddenly burst. "Oh God," he murmured as the image of Ariadne's frightened flashed in front of his eyes. "I need to help them. I have to get back!"

"Calm down!" Mal chuckled. "I've already said you don't belong here. You can't taste anything, you don't cast a shadow." Arthur glanced down. Sure enough, where Mal had the dark silhouette of her seated, childish form, he had only a patch of dry grass.

"What does this mean?" He asked quietly, running his fingertips over the bright point blades of grass where his shadow should have been.

"Like I said," she began. "It means you don't belong here."

"You mean I'm not dead?" he asked, hope inflating his chest.

"You were dead, until I found you."

The grass seemed to shimmer slightly and, before he could get a grip on his surroundings, it had become concrete. His feet seemed further away too and, as he began to get himself together, he realised his legs were no longer the length of his seven-year-old legs. His hands were larger too and he seemed higher up than before.

He turned.

He was standing on the platform of a train station, the sun beaming down on his back. Mal had also changed; she was exactly as he last remembered her. She was a tall woman, her dark hair curled and up loosely. Her eyelashes seemed more in proportion now and her face was one of beauty and grace.

She smiled, although it was a sad smile. She reached out, resting a hand on his shoulder. She had to lean up to do it and he realised he too must have returned to his normal stature.

"He needs you, Arthur," she said, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears. "And you need him too – even if you don't realise it, yet." She blinked, a few tears leaking from underneath her lids, spilling heavily onto her cheekbones.

Without even thinking, Arthur reached out and gently wiped them away with his thumb. She looked up.

"I'm sending you back," she said, her voice clogged with emotion. "I need you to help him, help them all. Save them, Arthur." He frowned.

"Why can't you go back?" he asked. "Can I give you my place?" Sadly, Mal turned her face away. He followed her gaze with his own and realised she was looking at her shadow, dark against the light grey tarmac. The space behind Arthur remained blank.

"I belong here, Arthur," she said, still staring at the floor. "I have no choice." She looked up. "You do. Find him, Arthur."

"How?" He asked, his eyes searching hers helplessly. Suddenly she smiled.

"You're waiting for a train," she said smiling, although tears were beginning to fall again. "You know where you hope that train will take you, but you can't know for sure."

A train had pulled onto the platform behind him, splitting his head open with its noise, obliterating Mal's next few words.

"Get on," she gestured towards the train. He nodded and boarded, shutting the hatch behind him with a click.

"But it doesn't matter," Mal called up to him, from her place on the platform. The train started to move, chugging out of the platform, leaving a cloud of steam behind it.

"Because we'll be there together!" Her words were final. Arthur knew she wasn't talking about him. She raised her hand, waving to him as she slowly disappeared, soon only a speck on the grey slab of the platform. Arthur waved back, before being consumed completely by the rays of light spilling in from the windows.


	8. Waking

**A/N – Thank you, once again, for all of your wonderful reviews, especially the long ones. I really appreciate it when people have taken the time to criticise my writing – I'm just masochistic like that! Sorry for the long wait for an update. Life has been incredibly messy recently. **

**Also, I had to do a great deal of unpleasant research for this chapter. I hope it doesn't make you feel too ill!**

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great – Ellen**

* * *

Ariadne knew from experience that waking up in a room with bright, neon lights and white bed linen was never a very good sign.

She'd made this observation through years of careful study – she'd always been a clumsy, often sickly child and had been rushed to hospital sporting various broken bones and embarrassing rashes that made her adult self cringe.

Blinking back watery-eyed tears, she glanced around, struggling to get her bearings.

She was in a hospital all right – a ward of some description – with around seven or eight beds crammed into the narrow room. Each bed was occupied, although she seemed by far the most able bodied; no one else was sitting up, all lost in various stages of unconsciousness.

With a jolt, she realised the next bed was occupied by Cobb. He was still asleep and Ariadne couldn't help wondering where he was. Had he not arrived yet? Was he in Limbo, with Mal, James and Phillipa? He looked peaceful, wherever he was, and Ariadne found herself reluctant to wake him from his blissful slumber.

But if she didn't, around two thousand people would lose their lives, including herself, Cobb, Eames Yusuf and Arthur. Arthur. ..ignoring the twinge she felt when she pictured his pallid, unconscious face, she leant over to nudge Cobb – wake him up from his sleep.

She didn't make it.

As her arm extended – suddenly seeming a great effort – she felt a retch in her stomach and, without thinking, vomited onto the pristine laminate flooring.

For a moment, everything seemed to slow down. Her gut ached and strained, anchoring her to the present. She gasped, heaving over the side of the bed. It didn't make sense; you couldn't get sick in dreams.

Could you?

The door on the other end of the corridor banged open, having been pushed by an elderly nurse wearing a crisp blue uniform. She was carrying a trap laden with a set of formidable-looking medical instruments but, seeing Ariadne leaning over the side of the bed, she set it down on the countertop, shaking her head as she did so.

"My, my, Ariadne," she said, moving over and helping to lower her back into a more comfortable position. "Not again, eh?" She grabbed a small plastic bowl from the bedside cabinet and held it in front of her now dripping mouth. "Let's mop you up." Without waiting for an invitation, the nurse reached over onto the bedside table and picked up a clump of tissues, using them to wipe the drippy, sticky and generally rather unpleasant substance from her chin.

"What..." Ariadne began, before feeling another unpleasant retch and vomiting heartily into the bowl again.

"That's it..." The nurse was rubbing her back in nice, soothing circles. "Get it all out of your system."

"After a few more minutes of vomiting, Ariadne felt a little better and, having managed to last a minute without puking into the bowl, braved a question.

"What's happening to me?" She asked, her voice scratch and sore.

"Just the usual symptoms," the nurse replied, wiping her hands on a towel. "Nothing out of the ordinary."

"What is the _ordinary_?" Ariadne asked, hysteria building up in her throat – so much so she thought she might puke again. The nurse squinted at her.

"Are you feeling alright, Ariadne?" she asked.

"Well, considering I've just puked no less than five times, I'd say that was a pretty stupid question!" Anger coursed through her veins, as if suddenly ignited from somewhere behind her stomach. Her arms burned, as if on fire. She glanced down and had to stop herself screaming.

All the way up her arms were a collection of hideous-looking blisters. Her skin was a disgusting shade of purple and, as she touched it, it felt weepy and doughy underneath her fingers. Her outburst forgotten, she blinked back tears.

"What's happening to me?" She whimpered.

"It's necrotizing fasciitis," the elderly nurse replied, seemingly unperturbed by Ariadne's previous fit. Her eyes seemed warm and forgiving, as if this was an everyday occurrence. "More commonly known as 'flesh-eating disease'."

Ariadne felt her stomach lurch again and, instinctively, reached for the bowl. The nurse was there already and had it ready just in time.

* * *

She wasn't sure how long she lay there; time seemed to blur together, with no distinct events to distinguish a minute from an hour apart from the occasional vomiting spurt. Her body felt exhausted – ironic, really, considering she was in a dream three layers thick – and she felt the almost constant desire to shut her eyes.

Cobb hadn't woken up yet. Every time she decided to reach over to wake him, her mind was swamped with nausea and she was paralysed for a few minutes as her stomach emptied itself into the yellow bowl she had come to loathe.

The nurse had left a while ago, although she occasionally flitted back into the ward, carrying formidable-looking medical equipment. At one point, she seemed to check on Cobb, recording his temperature and checking his pulse. These didn't look like particularly good signs. As Ariadne leant over to get a closer look, the saw that behind the bedclothes - dislodged by the nurses' activities - his chest was bare, covered only by a small bandage that did nothing to disguise the gaping, oozing sore consuming his left shoulder. The skin was puffy and swollen – a similar colour to her forearm and seemed to be expelling a strange sort of green mucus.

"Will he be alright?" she asked the nurse, her voice hoarse and bitter with the taste of vomit.

"I don't know," the nurse replied, swilling the thermometer in a glass of antibacterial cleaner. "We'll just have to wait and see."

While Ariadne was in great pain – her arm felt like it was going to fall off – it was clear that, whatever her own ailments, Cobb had it a lot worse.


	9. The Cottage in the Field

**A/N – Thanks for all feedback. This chapter is really important so I wanted to make sure I was completely happy with it before I posted it. I hope it's ok and not too complicated. As always, feedback would be brilliant. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

Eames had died several times.

The worst one had been when he'd accidentally fallen down a ravine. He'd been with Cobb at the time – a fact he'd come to regret due to the countless number of impressions that had followed; apparently his facial expression had been quite funny, judging by the hysteria expelling from Arthur at Cobb's impersonation.

Yes, the ravine-falling-down episode had been quite bad. There had been lots of rocks for extra head-banging pain and it was only after five minutes of rolling and hurting that Eames had finally met his maker and had woken up in a cold sweat.

Drowning hadn't been great either. That was probably second on his list of 'Deaths I'd Rather Not Repeat'.

And so as he crouched in the dust with his eyes streaming from the heat of the fire, cradling Ariadne's head to his chest, he realised he wasn't scared. He wasn't looking forward to this – burning to death had never sounded too great when Cobb had talked about it before – but he knew that Cobb and Ariadne, wherever they were, could be facing a lot worse.

He turned to check on Cobb and found himself staring straight into the barrel of a Browning Automatic Pistol.

The gun was thrust into his face, obscuring his view – but not before he caught a glimpse of a pair of familiar grey eyes and, all of a sudden, he was scared.

"You bastard," Eames whispered, a second before the shot was fired and everything became one huge swirling mass of pain and blackness.

* * *

The ground was soft and mossy, dotted with the occasional daisy or wildflower snaring their roots in the unruly tangle that was the grassy meadow. The sky seemed endless, a few clouds calmly making their way towards the horizon. A cottage, constructed of misshapen grey stone, crouched in the far corner of the field. The stones didn't look particularly stable and the ivy that threaded itself between the bricks and mortar seemed the only thing keeping them together, whispering and rustling in the slight breeze.

As Cobb opened his eyes, he realised he had absolutely no idea where he was. Not just geographically - although he had no recollection in that respect, either – but mentally, also. The blurry lines between the dream world and reality were now hazy, seeming to melt before his very eyes. With a blind stab of panic, he realised that, unless he gained more of a grip on his surroundings, he could very well end up doing something he'd regret – committing suicide for instance.

As the panic welled up inside him, threatening to tip him over the edge, he quickly frisked himself. There. In his jacket pocket. Moving over to the shallow, old wall, he pulled out the metallic spinning top – the only thing anchoring him to the present.

It rocked a little as it span on the old, mossy wall, but it refused to topple, confirming his suspicions: he was dreaming.

If not dreaming, he was somewhere unreal, floating in the shadowy depths of unconsciousness. He had now lost track of whatever the hell was going on. The last thing he could remember was the strange impression fear left on Eames' face. Fear hadn't suited him. Why had he been so scared?

Cobb's brain ached as his memory reluctantly returned, frame by frame. Fire. He remembered flames, roaring and consuming everything around them – including the air they breathed in, so much so it had felt as though they were inhaling pure fire.

Ariadne, crouching on the gravel, dirt ridden ground, her boots inches away from his face as he had slowly seeped into the next layer of dream.

That was it. He was now in the third layer of dream. But where was Ariadne? And where was the protection? It didn't seem very dangerous; it actually seemed quite nice. Sort of..._homely._

For lack of other options, Cobb slowly started to make his way through the field, picking his way across the uneven, muddy grass towards the little cottage. As he neared it, he realised that it wasn't a field. It was a garden, with rough squares marked out on the boggy ground catering for all manner of vegetables, all growing in neat lines next to one another. He smiled at the wobbly scarecrow with the spine of a broom handle and the head of a pumpkin guarding the shoots. The jacket hung around its spindly shoulders was actually not unlike his own, if a little more stained, and, as he rang the doorbell, he squinted at it trying to find an inconsistency. His pondering were interrupted, however, as the door swung open.

It was an angry face that greeted him on the other side of the door frame. The angry face of an old man, crouching under years of hard work. Cobb felt a twinge of the familiar nagging in the back of his mind, but he quickly brushed it aside. The man's jumper was holey and his feet encased in a pair of mouldy wellingtons. His startling blue eyes had found Cobb's and the angry face was replaced with one of wonder.

"I wondered when you'd turn up," the man whispered, his hand slipping from the flaking painted wood of the door. He seemed to recover quickly however, and stepped back into the narrow hallway. "You'd better come in, then." Bemused, Cobb followed the old man into the hall, nearly stepping on a grey tomcat in the process. It yowled and swatted at him with a dangerous-looking paw.

"That's Arthur," the man said. "He gets grouchy if someone disturbs his nap." Cobb had to stop himself choking with laughter.

"I have a friend called Arthur," he said. "He doesn't like being woken up either."

"No?" The man turned. "Where is he now?" Cobb frowned.

"I don't know," he replied, guilt suddenly nagging at his insides. "He got hurt..." He trailed off, watching the man as he moved from the hall into the kitchen. "Where am I?" he asked, now much less amused by the grumpy cat.

"You really need me to tell you?" the man replied, busy making a pot of tea. The kitchen was cramped and messy, although not dirty. It seemed like a very comfortable home.

"I know I'm in a dream," Cobb replied defensively, now slightly affronted. "I just don't know where."

"You're not dreaming, Cobb," the man replied. Cobb started.

"How do you know my name?" he asked, shakily.

"It doesn't matter. What matters is you getting back to dreaming." The man handed Cobb a mug of tea. "Sit." Cobb obeyed and took a seat in a large, comfortable-looking armchair by the fire. He sipped from the hot mug of tea.

"Hang on," he said. "How did you know I took sugar?" A whisper of a smile hinted at the corners of the man's lips. He shrugged.

"You just look like a sugar type of guy." They sat in silence for a minute, each weighing up the other.

"You seem taller than I remember," the man finally said.

"We've met before?" Cobb asked, remembering the twinge of déjà-vu he'd felt when he'd first opened the door.

"Oh yes." The man smiled into his tea. "But it was a long time ago." Cobb frowned.

"I don't remember."

"Don't worry – I'm not offended. I know what it feels like." The man leant forward and put his mug on the coffee table. The cat named Arthur leapt onto the arm of the chair and curled onto the man's lap, making Cobb jump and spill his tea down his jacket.

"I'm sorry," Cobb said, wiping his jacket with his sleeve.

"It's fine!" The old man sniggered. "It's not my jacket that's ruined. That's never going to come out, you know." Perhaps it was the words themselves, or the tone with which the man said them, but something made Cobb stop his futile attempt at cleansing his jacket.

"How do you know?" He asked. The man smiled again, an action that seemed to make his whole face look younger.

"Follow me," he said.

Cobb followed the old man back out through the cramped hallway and into the overgrown garden, only stopping when they had picked their way through the vegetable patch and were standing next to the weary-looking scarecrow. Without saying anything, the old man plucked the jacket off the shoulders off the broom handle and handed it to Cobb.

Cobb took the jacket. It was blue, leather, with a zip that jammed exactly three quarters of the way up. It was dirty, from constant exposure to the elements, but more importantly, it had a huge brown stain running from the breast pocket all the way down to the hem.

He glanced down.

His own jacket, blue leather with a jammed zip, sported an identical stain, still dripping with the dregs of his tea.

Arthur the Cat blinked at him from down on the floor, his head cocked to the side.

The old man smiled again and Cobb suddenly knew where he'd seen that face before. It was the face he saw everyday in the mirror as he took a shave in the morning, the face that was reflected in the red glimmer of his wine glass.

"You're me," Cobb whispered, the words dancing on the slight breeze. The man nodded still smiling.

"You're in Limbo, Cobb," The older Cobb said. "But don't worry – you don't stay long. In fact, I'd say you've only got another few minutes before you're brought back to life."

"Back?" Cobb asked, his brain still muddled from the epiphany he'd had only a few moments ago.

"The third layer of the dream," The older Cobb explained. "You're dying in hospital. A doctor is about to bring you back to life and when he does, Ariadne will be there with you. Work this out, Cobb. Everything's going to be ok." And with that, he turned on his heel and started to walk back to the cottage, Arthur the Cat at his heels.

"Wait!" Cobb called. "Why don't you come with me?" The older Cobb turned.

"I can't," he called back. "I'm waiting for someone." He pointed towards the edge of the field. It was misty, yet Cobb could still make out two silhouettes getting closer, one leaning heavily on the other. "One more thing," the older Cobb called, diverting his attention from the two approaching figures. "Say hello to Arthur from me." Cobb frowned.

"Why?" He called, although he could feel himself disappearing into nothingness, taking his words with him.


	10. The Mourner's Monologue

**A/N – Sorry for the long wait (again!). French Writing GCSEs are never particularly fun, unless you're French, of course. Anyway, I hope you like this chapter. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great – Ellen **

* * *

When Cobb's eyes had opened and she'd seen their startling blueness again, she'd almost cried.

She'd done a lot of crying, actually. The pain that now made her whole body shake had steadily been getting worse, regardless of the drugs the doctors and nurses seemed to want to pump into her. She had now realised exactly what was going on.

The disease, this _necrotizing fasciitis,_ the reason her stomach ached and her arm looked like it was going to drop off, was the security on this level of the dream. She wanted to kill Cobb for being so clever.

After all, you can't kill a disease. It just kills you. Slowly. Mercilessly. As she had waited for Cobb to return from wherever the hell he was, she'd rocked backwards and forwards on her metal cot, crying and cursing.

She was going to die. It was strange, she thought, how logical it was that it had come to this. She always pushed her luck, often too far, and it seemed only right that it was now luck's turn to push her. Off a ravine. Or in this case, the edge of sanity.

As she lay there, tears laden with despair rolling solemnly down her pale, clammy cheeks, she realised she had only one regret; she'd never see Arthur's face again.

She hadn't realised how much she needed him until she'd lost him. Watching him fall from the edge of the skyscraper, watching him fall from the top of the rickety staircase: both had been torturous and it was only now she recalled exactly how many minutes of the planning of Fischer's Inception she'd spent simply staring at him. She smiled, despite the fact it hurt her chapped lips, and tried to remember exactly the way he'd looked when he'd kissed her.

_It was worth a shot. _

Even though she was dying, about to purchase a one-way ticket to Limbo, she couldn't find it within her to regret the decisions that had brought her there. After all, she'd learnt how to live as she'd never lived before, dream as she'd never dreamed before, love – even if it was only now that she realised it.

It was too late. Arthur was dead. He would never be aware of the epiphany that was taking place on this small, cramped hospital bed, three layers deep in Dom Cobb's imagination.

Yes, she thought. That's what I regret; he'll never know. He'll never know that I love him.

Cobb had returned to consciousness a little while later.

"What happened?" she asked weakly, her voice scratchy and feeble.

"I really don't know," he replied, staring into space. "I think I was in Limbo."

"Limbo?"

"I know," he said, turning to look at her. He had to stop himself grimacing.

Dark shadows seemed smudged under her eyes and she appeared weak, like a rag doll left broken and unwanted. Her lips were dry and chapped, bleeding at the corner of her mouth and patches of her skin were purple and weepy. Her arm was wrapped in thick bandages, although patches of blood had seeped through here and there and, judging by the smell, something unpleasant was going on beneath it.

Guilt gnawed away at him, like a parasite. If he had never met her, had never employed her as his architect, she wouldn't be in this state, wouldn't be _dying. _She'd always seemed so young, so full of life and now she lay barely a metre away, sallow and weary – a shell of the girl she'd once been. She was a girl, really, after all. How old was she, anyway? Twenty-three, twenty -four? With another nervous twist of his stomach, Cobb pictured his own daughter, Phillipa, lying in Ariadne's place. Phillipa, who he wouldn't even let ride her own bike without being supervised by him and wearing the set of Barbie Doll kneepads, elbow-pads and crash helmet he'd bought her for Christmas. Ariadne had to have a father somewhere. Had anyone ever fixed stabilizers to the back of her bike? It was only then he realised how very little he knew about the dying girl in front of him. Who, beyond the team, would miss her?

"How did you get out?" she asked and, blinking back the tears he hadn't realised were forming, Cobb shrugged.

"I don't really know," he said, turning away to stare at the wall: a less depressing object of focus. "I will one day, though."

"What do you mean?" Ariadne asked, her sickly brow furrowed. Cobb turned to look at her; it was the least he could do.

"I met myself," he said. "I was a lot older, a lot grumpier too. I had a cat called Arthur..." He trailed off suddenly, before starting to laugh. The laughter took a hold of his body, making his stomach ache as he rocked. Tears rolled down the creases of his face: out of mirth or despair he was no longer sure.

Suddenly he felt a pair of arms wrap around him. He looked up, his eyes cloudy with tears, to see Ariadne's face barely inches away from his own. She was standing up, an obvious effort, and her legs started to shake with the weight. She slumped sideways onto his bed, still holding him close. It was then he realised he wasn't laughing anymore, that had he had never been. Instead, he cried into Ariadne's diseased shoulder, until the hysteria was replaced with the familiar sense of emptiness he'd assumed as soon as he'd returned to the dream-world.

"We're looking for a safe, right?" he suddenly asked, his voice croaky from his tears. Ariadne nodded. "Then let's find that fucking safe."


	11. Don't Forget to Breathe

**A/N- Two updates in twenty-four hours! Not bad for me! I hope you enjoy Chapter Eleven. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

It wasn't long before Ariadne's legs gave way. Cobb lifted her up and, slightly unnerved at how little she weighed, continued along the brightly lit corridor.

Getting out of the ward had actually been surprisingly easy. Whatever had happened to Cobb, thought Ariadne, had certainly helped their cause and now, perfectly recovered from the disease she was suffering so terribly from, he was able to support both of their weight with surprising ease.

They had begun their search by simply moving from room to room, examining the contents of each. The rooms had mainly comprised of offices: an obvious place to keep a safe, although they had so far found none. They had not yet come across any other wards or, indeed, any more patients than the ones that had been asleep in their own ward. Ariadne wasn't sure whether this should calm her or unnerve her and so she decided to ignore it altogether, dismissing it as unimportant, and instead tried to focus on the more pressing task of not dying. This was not an easy feat and, as Cobb carefully put her down on a desk as he turned to inspect a nearby filing cabinet, she coughed and found the front of her smock covered in a smattering of blood. Cobb turned and, upon seeing the red smear, his face fell.

"I'll be fine," Ariadne wheezed. "Just carry on looking." Cobb nodded and, with a new sense of urgency, continued to search the cabinet.

They searched three more rooms before arriving at a large, deserted operating theatre.

It was dark and, with only the green glow of some of the equipment monitors to illuminate the room, the furniture cast an eerie shadow across the dingy walls. A dull, computerized hum echoed around the large room, making Ariadne's ears ache. There was also another sound: a sort of metallic drilling that sounded somehow unsteady, as if it was going to stop any second. Ariadne suddenly felt a wave of déjà-vu, as if she'd heard it before.

Stepping further into the room, Cobb carefully placed Ariadne on the surgical bed, where she flopped heavily onto the thin padding.

"I won't be a minute," he whispered and she smiled weakly, appreciating his effort to comfort her, even if he was blatantly lying. He smiled nervously and, turning his back on her, started to examine the monitors.

Mr X was going to have a lot to explain, thought Ariadne as she lay on the surgical bed. Whoever he was, he was insane and had very little regard for human life: prepared to sacrifice the lives of thousands just so he could get whatever it was he wanted from the mind of Dominic Cobb. She tried to think of possible candidates. Browning and Fischer seemed the most obvious, seeing as the team had altered their lives recently. Was this a simple revenge stunt? It seemed a bit harsh if it was. Even when scared and in danger, Robert Fischer had never seemed bloodthirsty.

Ariadne rolled over so she was lying on her back – a position she had discovered was slightly more comfortable – and shut her eyes, listening to the shuffling of Cobb's shoes on the laminate flooring. She could still hear the other sound, the strange one. Somehow, it unnerved her and her breathing slowed and hitched slightly. Startled, Ariadne felt her heart hammer and she tasted blood in her mouth. Was this it? Was this what dying felt like? She tried to speak to alert Cobb to her condition, but found her breath caught in her throat, as if someone was strangling her slowly. She clamped her eyes shut and clenched hold of the fabric beneath her, dragging it closer. As she did so, a small remote control, no doubt for controlling the bed, crashed to the floor and slid over to where Cobb was crouched in front of a set of cabinets.

"Ariadne?" Suddenly he was there, stroking her hair. Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes as she gasped and gagged at the air.

"Can't...breathe..." she stammered. Cobb flung open cabinet after cabinet, searching for some sort of breathing apparatus. It was as he opened the last one, nearest the bank of monitors, that he saw it.

A small, metal safe. The metallic noise had suddenly got louder and he realised it must be coming from within the safe.

"I've found it!" he exclaimed, turning to look at Ariadne. She was holding her throat and gasping.

"Oh...right," he continued to throw open cabinets before finally locating a small plastic breathing mask. He grabbed it and ran over to the bed, thrusting it onto Ariadne's face.

"Deep breaths," he murmured as she gasped and trembled, her lungs scrabbling for air. After a few minutes, her breathing seemed to return to normal and, as he removed the mask from her face, Cobb noticed that the mouthpiece was coated with a mixture of phlegm and blood.

"Sorry about that," Ariadne wheezed. "I'll try not to die on you."

"Thanks," Cobb replied, before turning to look at the safe. "What do you think is in there?"

"I don't know," she replied, tucking her hair behind her ear. She watched as Cobb moved forward and span the dial of the safe between his fingers. Of course – they didn't know the combination.

"I'll be a minute," Cobb murmured. Oh yes – Dom Cobb, master thief, wouldn't let a mere combination yet in the way of the most important heist of his life – from himself. Suddenly, Ariadne felt a lurch of terror. What was in the safe? Would Cobb immediately know that they'd betrayed him, that he was stealing from his own mind?

With a dull, metal click, the safe opened. Ariadne realised where she had heard that sound before: as a child, playing with her spinning tops. With a cold feeling of dread, Ariadne suddenly felt like she knew what was in the safe. Cobb reached forward, obscuring Ariadne's view of the safe as he did so.

He seemed to freeze, his arm extended. The noise stopped.

"What?" Ariadne asked. "What is it?"

He turned and, clenched in his fist, was a small, metal spinning top.

Ariadne froze. Cobb stared at it, holding it between his thumb and forefinger.

"I don't understand," he said, turning it over. "I had it with me before. How has it got here?"

"I don't know," Ariadne said truthfully.

"Oh, but I do." The voice came from the doorway.

Slowly, Ariadne turned.

A pair of cold, grey eyes. Eyes she knew. Eyes that had never seemed particularly cold before. Her breath caught in her throat and she immediately knew she was staring at the elusive Mr X.

Only it wasn't Browning and it wasn't Fischer...


	12. Reunited in the Face of Death

**A/N – So this is it. The biggie. Thanks for all your suggestions as to the identity of Mr X. As for the real answer, you'll just have to read on! I hope you like this chapter!**

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - ElLen**

* * *

It was then that everything seemed to make sense. Even time held its breath as Miles Labouter, professor of Archaeology and grandfather to Phillipa and James Cobb, stepped into the operating theatre, his hand clenching an ugly-looking Browning automatic pistol.

Ariadne's world seemed to tip upside down. Only a few days before, he'd lectured her on the improper use of Pythagoras' theorem and now wearing what looked like the same mustard coloured jumper, he was about to kill her.

"Professor Miles?" Ariadne asked, even though she already knew the answer. After all, who else had the knowledge and expertise to infiltrate the mind of Dom Cobb, but the man who'd taught him? "You're Mr X?"

Miles looked at her for a moment, his steely grey eyes bearing a sort of hatred she never seen them hold before.

"I expected better from my star pupil," he said quietly, stepping further into the room.

"What?" Cobb. _Oh no. _"Miles? What are you doing here? Who's Mr X?" He seemed angry and Ariadne didn't blame him.

"You mean Ariadne didn't tell you? Or Arthur? I thought you were… friends." Miles left his sentence hanging deliberately, obviously playing for effect.

"Don't listen to him, Cobb!" Ariadne suddenly exclaimed, clutching her stomach as another wave of crippling pain overtook her small form. "He's just a projection!" The lie came easily and Ariadne suddenly realised exactly how much lying she'd done in the last few hours.

"Clever," Miles said thoughtfully, stroking his stubbled chin, before turning to Cobb, who was staring at both of them with wide, increasingly agitated-looking eyes. "I am no projection," Miles said calmly. "Ariadne is lying. She's done a lot of that recently."

"Cobb!" Unable to shout anything except his name, Ariadne was now bent double on the bed, clutching her knees to her chest. Cobb raced over and held her hand, while Miles stood over them, the gun still clutched comfortably in his palm.

"How did you get here, Dom?" Miles asked over the top of Ariadne's whimpers and grunts of pain. Cobb frowned.

"I'm a bit preoccupied here, Miles," he said, holding Ariadne's head in his arms while her whole body shook. "It's ok, Ariadne," he whispered. "It'll be ok…"

"Where were you, Dom?" Miles insisted, crouching next to him. "It was a hotel. You were eating dinner…" Cobb turned to look at him.

"Why do you care?" he asked, frustrated now.

"Who else was there?" Miles asked firmly. Still frowning, Cobb turned back to Ariadne, trying to ignore him. "I'll tell you who else was there, Dom," Miles said. "Arthur. Do you remember him?"

And suddenly, Cobb did.

The sparkling of the chandeliers in the hotel lobby, the tinkling of cutlery, the red swill of sherry in his glass: the memories all flooded his brain, drowning him in their brilliance. And then he saw a face.

"Yes," he murmured, still staring down at Ariadne's sweaty brow. "Arthur was there. He seemed agitated about something. He…drugged me." As if stabbed by a steel knife, Cobb felt his heart break. "He…I don't understand..."

Miles nodded.

"You're in your own mind now, Dom," he said, his voice soothing and smooth. "He wanted you to steal something from your own mind."

"Don't…listen, Cobb," Ariadne whimpered, every letter an effort. "Don't…listen…to…him."

But Cobb was listening.

"But he's my friend," he murmured.

"Sometimes we place our trust in the most precarious places," Miles said thoughtfully. "Even in those we taught…" He nodded towards Ariadne, still writhing on the operating table. Cobb dropped her hand onto the hard surface where it lay, sweaty and feverish.

"You too?" Cobb asked, his tone laced with hurt and betrayal. The tears leaking from Ariadne's eyes were no longer only from the physical pain.

"We…had…no…choice," she whimpered. "He…made…us."

"Who made you?" Cobb asked, leaning forward in order to hear her.

"I did." The gun was now pointed at the back of Cobb's sandy head. Miles was holding it.

"Why?" Cobb exclaimed, fear and confusion scrambling up the thoughts in his head.

"Shared dreaming has done nothing but destroy people's lives," he said, his voice calm and measured. "Including that of my daughter. She was doomed as soon as she met you. Anything and anyone connected with dreaming has to be destroyed, in order for more lives to be saved and yes, I am including myself in that equation." He cocked the gun.

"But what about Phillipa and James?" Cobb exclaimed, fear beating a hole in his chest where his heart should have been. "What about your grandchildren?"

"Honestly, Dom?" Miles asked, his voice suddenly casual. "I think they're better off without you."

A bullet was fired. It didn't come from Miles' gun.

Through the sweat and tears clouding her vision, Ariadne glanced up. A bright red stain slowly seeped through the sleeve of Miles' jumper.

He stumbled back a few feet, before turning to stare at the figure now framed in the doorway.

Standing there, though with one leg dangling limply behind him and his hair messy and unkempt, was Arthur.

Ariadne's heart soared. He wasn't dead. _He wasn't dead. _Her heart didn't have much time to soar, however, as a barrage of bullets thundered into the plaster above Arthur's head.

He threw himself behind a large monitor as Miles' bullets continued to rain down on him, shattering the glass screen.

Cobb picked Ariadne up and, bending his head in order to avoid the merciless shower of bullets, took cover behind a metal filing cabinet. Gently, he lowered Ariadne's head to the floor before pulling his own gun from its holster on his back.

"Stay here," he murmured. "Don't get yourself hurt."

"Cobb," Ariadne whimpered. She grabbed his arm, desperate he listen to her. "I'm sorry." He nodded solemnly before darting out from behind the filing cabinet to help Arthur.

Sitting slumped behind the monitor, Arthur reloaded his gun and took a deep breath.

It hadn't been easy, coming face to face with the dead bodies of both Yusuf and Eames, but he had known they were somewhere in Limbo, waiting for him to come and get them. What had been so much harder, was discovering the sleeping form of the man that had killed them, the man Arthur had known for ten years of his life - had trusted for ten years of his life. But the hardest part, the cripplingly awful, heartbreaking part, had been seeing Ariadne, weak and pale, writhing in pain on the hospital bed. If asked, Arthur would have said that was the worst part, because it was.

Chasing Miles through the dream layers had been fairly easy once he'd actually come to terms with the fact they'd all been betrayed. His leg had been annoying, though the pain had lessened slightly with every passing layer.

A pair of familiar brown suede shoes appeared on the other side of the monitor before Cobb rounded the corner and, with another cascade of bullets, ended up crouching next to Arthur.

"Where is he?" he asked.

"Far side of the operating theatre," Cobb replied, reloading his gun. "Behind the big, blue crate."

Turning, they both fired a couple of rounds in Miles' direction.

"I'm sorry," Arthur shouted, over the din of the bullets. "He was going to kill…"

"I know!" Cobb shouted back. "Save it!" Arthur nodded. Now wasn't the time.

"I'm going to run for it," Cobb said, gesturing over to another monitor a couple of feet away. "I'll have a better view from there…"

"No!" Arthur cried, although it was already too late. He watched helplessly as Cobb rose and broke cover, sprinting towards the other end of the operating theatre.

He made it halfway there. It was only by the sudden clipping of his heels and the bending of his knees that Arthur knew Cobb had been shot. He cried out, although to no avail. Cobb fell to the floor with a thud and Arthur knew he was already dead.

"You bastard, Miles!" he yelled, his voice breaking as tears threatened to fall.

"You're a coward, Arthur," came the reply, from somewhere to his left. "That bullet should have been yours." It was as Arthur got to his feet, ready to show Miles exactly who was a coward, that he felt a hand on his.

Ariadne. She'd crawled from over the other side of the room, keeping low at all times.

"No," she rasped, clutching his hand in hers. "Don't go. It's what he wants." Arthur nodded and slumped back down, resting his head on the broken glass of the monitor. "Don't listen to him," Ariadne whispered. "You're brave – the bravest person I know. Miles knows that, that's why he's trying to coax you out. Leave it to me."

Arthur frowned at her.

"What are you going to do?" he asked.

"We're not going to go to him," she explained, cryptically. "So he's going to have to come to us."

As she said this, a great grinding sound permeated the already loud atmosphere of the operating theatre. Arthur turned back to Ariadne.

"What's that?" he asked, but she had her eyes screwed shut in concentration and didn't answer him. Suddenly, the back wall, the wall furthest away from them, started to move forward, pushing all of the equipment forward with it.

Monitors, computers, the filing cabinet and the large hospital bed all fell over each other, bunched up towards the edges of the room.

"Genius," Arthur murmured, squeezing Ariadne's hand.

It didn't take long to find Miles; his leg was trapped beneath the filing cabinet and he was unconscious. His face looked peaceful, serene and Ariadne had o stop herself crying as she recognised the friendly face of her favourite teacher.

"What now?" Ariadne asked, from where Arthur was holding her, bunched up in his arms.

"We find Cobb, Eames and Yusuf," Arthur said. "In Limbo."


	13. Time Stands Still for No One

****

**A/N – Apologies for the long wait! My computer has been overtaken by thousand of viruses and I'm been busy busting my brains out over revising for my mock exams. Thanks to my friend, Sophie, for helping me out with this chapter, even if she doesn't realise how yet. I hope you like it. **

**Thanks for reading, reviews are great - Ellen**

**

* * *

**

Hannah Reese had never had a bomb strapped to her before. In fact, in every way possible, today had been a fairly new experience.

She might be able to put it on her C.V.

Of course, that was if she survived the next few minutes and, the way the unconscious bodies on the floor were looking – still unconscious – she wouldn't have betted on it. She only had the next few minutes, too. She'd been sitting on the leather chair in the corner of the room for two hours and fifty three minutes.

She had seven minutes left.

Oh dear.

That was just it - that was all she could come up with. Oh dear. _Oh dear. _She'd never been a huge swearer and now, seemingly staring into the giant, gaping Jaws of Death, it didn't seem she was about to become one now. That was a shame, she thought. Things might have been different if she'd occasionally let rip with a few profanities. In fact, there were lots of things she could have done differently, now she thought about it. She could have actually worked up the courage to get that tattoo when she was nineteen, instead of hovering in a haze of worry by the glass door of the slightly unsavoury-looking goth store. She might have worked up the courage to properly kiss Jared Burkhan, instead of wittering incessantly about her cat as they'd stood outside her apartment door.

She might have told the silver haired old man with the cold, grey eyes and the Browning automatic handgun – the man now lying on the couch near the window - to go screw himself.

Actually, no. There was no way she could have ever done that, no matter how many tattoos or kisses from the class heartthrob she may possess. There had been something in the eyes of that man, something deadly and cold, that had slowly sucked any hint of determination out of her.

But now, sitting in the hotel room on one of the fancy leather chairs she'd always admired, she found a little hint of the determination that old man had tried so very hard to extinguish and inhaled it, taking deep, steady breaths that spread the feeling all the way through her body, from the lobes of her ears all the way to the painted, purple tips of her toenails.

They were asleep, right? She thought, surveying the unconscious bodies of the band of strangers that were somehow supposed to save her.

She'd just have to wake them up.

She got up, the red numbers blinking on her chest.

00:06

She'd lost a whole minute thinking. Note to self, she thought. Do less thinking.

She approached the bed, giving the scary man, the older one, a second glance. Lying across it, his head lolling slightly off the side f the pillow, was the sandy-haired man, the one that the dark-haired, suit-clad one had dragged back from the restaurant.

She slapped him.

Nothing. Maybe she hadn't done it hard enough. She did it again. Nothing.

Water.

Quickly, she hurried over to the kitchenette. In the sink stood a plastic washing-up bowl. She filled it hurriedly, splashing herself in the process.

00:05

Hurry up, Hannah.

The water swilled around in the blue plastic bowl as she gingerly carried it over to the bed. Unceremoniously, she dumped the water over the sandy man's head, squeezing her eyes shut as it cascaded down, sticking his hair to his forehead and his jacket to his chest.

But he didn't wake up.

That was weird.

She moved back to the sink, filling the washing-up bowl only semi-full this time.

She selected another body: the Englishman. He'd been nice to her before. She hoped he'd wake up.

He didn't.

He looked almost comical, the hair plastered to his face, his wet shirt displaying the tattoo he had on his left shoulder.

00:04

Desperate now, Hannah grabbed the vase by on the bedside cabinet, chucking out the lilies that had inhabited it only a few moments ago and threw it carelessly onto the face of the dark haired man lying slumped on the metal chair near the window.

It was then that she nearly had a heart attack.

Instead of lying still and motionless, as his companions had done before him, he jolted forward out of sleep, his eyes wild and startled-looking.

"Jesus Christ!" Hannah clutched at her heart. The dark-haired man shook the water out of his hair.

"That was you?" he asked, stunned. "You woke me up?"

"Yeah," Hannah replied, dazed. Then, remembering why she'd woken him in the first place, she glanced down at her chest.

00:03

Terrified, she looked up at him, desperately trying to communicate her fear. She needn't have worried; he seemed to have got the message.

He leapt up and grabbed one of the straps holding the bomb to her body, peeling off the Velcro with a snap. Immediately, Hannah felt her shoulders screaming in relief as the back piece peeled off her sticky, sweaty back.

"What are you going to do?" she asked, as he took it from her shoulders and laid it on the bed, next to Cobb's now drenched sleeping form. He seemed to pause for a second as he took in the unconscious form of the older man lying on the couch before turning back to the mass of wires and battery packs laid out before him.

"I'm going to defuse it," he said.

"How're you going to do that?"

"Bear with me a minute."

"We don't have a minute!"

"Actually," he said, pointing towards the red display. "Technically we have two."

00:02

"Oh my god," Hannah moaned and moved over to the corner to hyperventilate.

Arthur turned the LED display around in his hands, feeling the sweat pool on his forehead and run down his nose. He didn't know what the hell he was doing. He must have missed the Bomb Disposal 101 Class Cobb gave him when first inducted into the business. Actually, no, there hadn't been one. Thanks for that, Dom. He shot his unconscious friend an irritated glance.

Actually, it was more than irritated. It was frantic, desperate and paranoid probably with a little dash of sheer terror thrown in for good measure. Never before, not even when falling from the side of the building, or falling from the top of the lighthouse, or facing Miles in the operating theatre of the dream's operating theatre, had he ever felt surer he was going to die.

"Should I try waking her up?" Hannah was standing over Ariadne's sleeping form. She was curled up on the rug, her hair covering her face. Arthur's stomach dropped.

"No," he said. "Leave her asleep." He didn't want her to know he'd failed.

00:01

One minute left of life. What do you do in one minute? Not a lot really. He twiddled one of the wires round in his hand.

He could at least try. He might disable it. Of course, he might blow them all up but, seeing as they were all going to get blown up anyway, he could at least give it a go.

He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his penknife.

It was an old knife, with a chip out of the blade. This would be the last time he would ever use it.

Three wires, three colours.

"Hannah," he said. "Blue, red or green?"

"What?" she asked.

"Just choose."

"Er...red?" Red had been the colour of her first car. And she'd always liked the red fruit pastilles best.

Arthur placed the tip of his blade underneath the red wire. He'd never been a religious man, but right now, he wasn't praying to physics.

The red wire snapped and, in that second, time seemed to stop.


	14. The Boy With Blue Fire in His Eyes

**A/N – Seventy reviews! This is by far the most support I've ever had for a story and I'd like to thank everyone who has taken the time to leave a comment. Alerts and additions to favourites lists are also wonderful. Thank you, everyone!**

**This chapter is almost three times the length my chapters usually are. It wasn't supposed to be. It just sort of came out. **

**Finally, if I don't post again beforehand, I hope you all have a lovely Christmas and New Year. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great – Ellen **

* * *

It doesn't take much to break a man.

Humans, lost in the depths of their own vanity, presume themselves complex, magnificent creatures with the world at the end of their fingertips. Truthfully, humans need only one thing to make them break.

Love.

It's a double-edged sword. It provides all the answers and then promptly takes them away in the same breath. It gives weak men strength and strong men weaknesses.

It is no wonder then, that it was love that broke Miles Lebouter.

It had been hard, letting Cecile go. Married at twenty-two, parents by thirty, Miles and Cecile were inseparable, two halves of a whole.

It had been a sunny day when he'd walked into the café on the corner of Saint Antoiné, his head full of the spires and gargoyles his mind had moulded. He had been certain that the interior of his head was a cathedral, letting in light through the sainted glass of his avid imagination, a sanctuary for his wild dreams and beliefs.

Of course, that was before he'd met Cecile.

Cecile. The girl with the yellow hair and the long, spindly eyelashes, the girl who he'd suffered through at least six weeks of greying, bland coffee for, before he'd finally gathered together the courage to buy her dinner.

He remembered the rush of nerves, the tingling of his heart and the sweat slowly gathering between his neck and the stiff collar of his shirt as his knuckles gripped the edge of the plastic countertop.

"Do baristas ever let customers buy them coffee?" He had prayed his voice had sounded alluring, rather than sinister.

She had turned slowly, smiling.

"It depends who it is that's doing the buying," she'd said, raising an eyebrow in the way he would later discover was flirtatious and not at all in the same category as the 'you've-just-stepped-over-the-metaphorical-line' eyebrow raise she sometimes did.

And so, over mugs of grey, bland coffee, they fell in love.

If Miles' mind was a cathedral, Cecile's was the boudoir of Madame Antoinette, or the entrance hall of Blenheim Palace – a space awash with riches and intricacies no one but the architect himself would notice. The architect and Miles.

She was not particularly ambitious, he thought. She seemed content with living her life on that very corner, the corner between Saint Antoiné and la Rue de les Söers, selling coffee and reading paperback romance books under the counter when she thought her terrifying boss, Elise, wasn't looking.

Miles was wrong.

Cecile did want something. The very something that had wandered, absent-mindedly and oblivious to the stares of more than half of the females in the crowded coffee shop, in from the sweltering heat outside.

She'd heard him offer his seat to the old lady with the tired legs, seen him offer to carry the pregnant lady's tray to the table for her, all from her position behind the counter, dog-eared book lying abandoned on her lap.

Ever since he'd wandered into her life, the heroes in her book started to appear more and more two-dimensional, like the empty shells of men, uttering suave lines and sipping the sort of champagne it would take two years of her wages to afford. They weren't likeable, they weren't real.

She'd almost fainted when he'd offered to buy her a drink, his warm, grey eyes open and inviting.

She really did faint when he asked her to marry him.

He'd been standing behind her on the hotel room balcony, so luckily he'd managed to catch her before she'd fallen over the railing to her death under a car on the busy Parisian street below.

They'd always liked Paris. He for the architecture, her for the romance and it was to Paris they returned a few years later, married, with a child and Cecile's stomach bloated with the beginning of another.

Mal was three when they'd bought the house. An 18th century building, square with wooden clapboards painted blue. They painted the clapboards white, then green. Cecile couldn't decide. Cecile couldn't decide about anything, actually, including a name for the new baby. Miles liked Jerome for a boy and Mariénne for a girl, although Cecile quite liked Todd.

Unfortunately, the second child never came.

Cecile had fallen, climbing the stairs one day. Something had broken, something deep within her and the baby had died, along with a part of both Miles and Cecile themselves. Even after Cecile had been taken away to hospital and the blood cleaned from the stairwell, that place, just between the landing and the fifth step, seemed to reek of sadness.

They'd moved as soon as possible, much to little Mal's horror. Oblivious to the great sadness looming in the draughty corners of the rooms, she'd loved the house with its lovely green garden and her big bedroom. To make matters even worse, the dolls' house Miles had made her for her sixth birthday, the dolls' house in which she placed all of her secret possessions, had been smashed accidentally by the removal men as one of them had tripped. As his daughter cried over the splintered remains of her favourite thing in the whole world, Miles felt as though his life was no longer in his own hands.

It was a man called Poely that had first helped Miles dream.

It had been a board meeting. The clients Miles was currently working for – he was building an aquarium – had called a meeting in Calais. That evening, in the darkened smoking room of the Hotel Bar, Miles had engaged in riveting conversation with a man named Jack Daniels, whose bitter monologue seemed to numb the pain with every breath of intoxication.

"Whiskey should never be drunk alone." Someone pulled themselves onto stool next to him. Miles inclined his head slightly, wincing as the drumming in his head missed a beat.

The man was fairly tall with grey hair thinning around his forehead.

"Thomas Poely," he said, extending a hand. They shook. Poely nodded at the glass of amber liquid clenched in Miles' hand. "Whiskey helps you escape," he said, quietly. "What are you trying to escape, Miles?"

Without wondering how this Thomas Poely knew his name, Miles thought for a minute.

"Reality," he said, finally. "I'm trying to escape reality."

A grin slowly invaded Poely's features.

"Well," he said, turning his own empty glass over in his hands. Miles suddenly realised he hadn't seen Poely actually drink anything. "I might be able to help you with that."

Thomas Poely Jnr. showed him a world of hope, a world that had futures without bleeding wives or crying daughters, and he liked this world he saw.

And it was full of creation.

Everything in that world was created by him, and everything in that world was good.

Soon, Miles didn't care that the guttering on their new house was falling down as, in his dreams, they still lived in the old house with the white and green clapboards, together. Miles, Cecile, Mal and Todd. Todd – the lost baby he was sure was a son – grew up in front of him. In dreams, he taught him to read, to write, to dream.

Reality was no longer an inviting place and so Miles, with the help of Thomas Poely, escaped it.

* * *

Miles was forty when death claimed Cecile as its own. Although, Miles secretly thought she'd been dead a long before the cancer invaded her body. She was doomed the moment Miles had lost reality.

Mal was ten.

After the solemn funeral, to which only a few people attended, now strangers – they hadn't featured in Miles' trips into his own imagination – Miles looked at the little girl standing in the hallway. Really looked at her. Dark smudges of sorrow swept along her cheekbones, her hollow cheeks were no longer rosy and pretty, her dark eyes showed a lifetime of sadness and neglection, not just ten years, although for her they were one and the same.

From that moment on, Miles swore he would dream no more. Todd, Cecile and the old Mal weren't real – they were just the pitiful memories of a weak man, visions of what could have been. Mal - this Mal, standing still and frail in the hallway of the house with the broken guttering – was real. She would be his life now.

He took her to Rome and Vienna, showed her the buildings that had inspired him as a young man. She was a quiet child and, as she grasped his large hand in her little one as they passed through the crowds of noisy tourists, she said nothing, only drinking it in through her large dark eyes.

They began to understand each other. Both were solitary creatures and enjoyed simply living, sitting in the still of the morning air on the outside porch, or taking long, aimless walks in the field around the house. Neither of them were people of words, although this suited them well; you didn't need words to live.

* * *

Miles began to teach. He enjoyed it, watching young minds filled with determination and inspiration cram into his classroom as he spoke of the Coliseum or Notre Dame. They were good with words, his pupils - intellectuals to give them their proper name. He read their essays and in them seemed to hear their voices, brimming with excitement. In their voices he heard his own, from before he ventured into the coffee shop on the corner of Saint Antoiné.

Before love had broken him.

He remembered one voice in particular. Among two-hundred voices, all singing the same song, he heard one that seemed to sing louder than the rest. He imagined it a deep, rich baritone, filling him with nostalgia and longing.

As he turned the slightly scrappy pages of the notebook the piece had been scribbled in, he felt as though he was peering into a window displaying his former self. Each slightly indecipherable word, every frantic crossing out was like a cheery little wave from a time long gone, a bittersweet glimpse into what could have been.

He turned to the very front of the book.

The student's name was Dominic T. Cobb.

He found him in the fourth row back. He was sitting alone, leafing through a paperback novel before the class began properly. With a slight lurch from somewhere in his abdomen, Miles remembered interrupting someone else reading a paperback a long time ago.

"Dominic Cobb?"

The boy looked up.

He wasn't a boy, really, although Miles thought of him as such, with sandy hair that fell messily over his face and full, rounded cheeks. It was his eyes that intrigued Miles the most though. They were a startling blue but they also seemed to have a strange texture. Almost like flames.

Yes, Dominic Cobb had blue fire in his eyes.

"Professor?" he asked, startled. American. He snapped his book shut. The words _Jeffery Archer – Not a Penny More Not a Penny Less _stared up at him from the cover. Interesting.

"Enjoying it?" Miles asked, signalling to the book.

"Yeah," Cobb replied. "It's quite good."

"The ending's brilliant."

"I'll look forward to it."

Miles smiled quickly before adopting a more serious tone – something he had perfected after seven years of teaching.

"I've finished reading your essay. The one about Bauhaus engineering."

"Oh?" Cobb suddenly looked uneasy. Miles contemplated this for a moment.

"I'd like to see you in my office after class."

"Yes, professor."

Without another word, Miles moved up to the front desk and addressed the class at large. Throughout his lesson, he couldn't help but sneak looks at the sandy head in the fourth row back. His expression seemed slightly strained. Miles stifled a smirk. He'd let him stew a little longer.

He was stirring his tea when Cobb burst into his office.

"I'm so sorry, professor," he gabbled, his face flushed and sweaty. "I know my work isn't up to standard. I'll leave the course at once. I'm sorry for wasting your time..."

"Dom."

"I honestly don't know what possessed me to try architecture. I'll try something else, like accountancy..."

"Dom, just sit..."

"My uncle's an accountant, so you don't have to feel guilty. I'm sure he'll help me with catching up on the course. I'll clear my stuff out now." Finally, Cobb drew breath.

"Dom, I didn't ask you to come here to bollock you," Miles said, calmly. Cobb seemed shocked at Miles' choice use of language. "Please, just sit down." Cobb did so, perching nervously on the green, velvet armchair opposite Miles. Miles sat too, observing Cobb from behind his glasses.

"I wanted to talk to you," Miles began, taking a sip from his Looney Tunes mug. Mal had bought him it. "Because I think you have potential." Cobb raised his eyebrows.

"Oh?"

"Yes," Miles smiled. "I read about a hundred essays a week, Dom, and the only one I've every truly enjoyed reading is yours. It's creative, interesting and passionate. Granted, some of your calculations are a little off but in the business you can hire a friend to take care of all the research and the other stuff you might not like. Or you can study hard and do it yourself. But believe me, Dom, no amount of studying will ever be able to bring about what you've already got."

"What?" Cobb asked, confused now.

"Pure creation, Dom," Miles replied, smiling. "You see it everywhere, I know you do. I know that because once, I was just like you."

Cobb seemed to think for a minute.

"You're right," he said, finally. "I do see creation everywhere, but the things I see...they're...they're not..." He sighed. "They don't exist. They can't exist. Not in this world, anyway. They're impossible."

And it was then that Miles saw the future. A glorious future it was too – full of the impossible and things so beautiful that only a few people would be allowed to see them, all enclosed in a single dream.

"I've got something to show you," he said, finally.

Miles Labouter taught Dominic Cobb to dream and, in return, Dominic Cobb provided Miles with something he'd wasted his whole life hoping for.

Miles only discovered this a few weeks later when, after awaking and removing the needle from his hand, he found Dom's notebook on the table next to the PASIV case.

"Dominic T. Cobb," he said, as Dom got up blearily from the green,velvet chair he now seemed to think of as his. "What does the T stand for?"

"Todd," Cobb replied, rubbing his eyes. "After my grandfather."

Miles didn't move for a few minutes.

* * *

It was inevitable really, Miles thought. Some people were meant to be together. Romeo and Juliet, Miles and Cecile...Dom and Mal. As an unofficial member of the household, Dom seemed to be spending more and more time in the house with the now-fixed guttering, although Miles had a feeling this was becoming less and less to do with dreaming and more and more to do with the dusky beauty Mal had become.

Now twenty-three, Mal looked every bit as beautiful as Cecile had done, only in a completely different way. Where Cecile had been blonde – a perfect picture of innocence – and beautiful in a light, fluffy way, Mal had none of her perkiness. Instead, the sadness that had haunted her childhood seemed to hang about her, giving her a solemn, brooding manner. Her eyes were heavy lidded and framed with exquisitely long lashes. She was tall and willowy – grace seeming to leak out of her at every opportunity.

Dom was enchanted.

Miles remembered the feeling of joy-filled panic when Cecile had entered the room and could clearly see the same expression of mismatched feelings written across Dom's face whenever Mal approached. Mal seemed not impartial, either. Her hips seemed to swing a little more enthusiastically whenever the young man was near, her lids grew heavier, her English more laboured. Whenever these moments arose, Miles would find something very important for himself to do in the furthest possible corner of the house from the two love-sick youngsters.

One morning, a few months after Dom had bravely asked Miles' permission to take Mal out for dinner, Miles found his daughter sitting on the porch, as was her habit. A small easel was propped on the table and, with every stroke of her pencil, a form was beginning to take shape on the paper in front of her. Quietly, so he wouldn't alert her to his presence, Miles crept forward and, as he glimpsed the drawing, his breath caught in his throat.

It was the dolls' house – the one that Miles had made her, the one that had smashed into splinters on the hall floor so many years ago.

Unnerved, Miles retreated into the house, desperately trying to stem the flow of memories threatening to eat him away.

* * *

Dom and Mal were married three years later, in April, with the baby expected to arrive in August. Phillipa, they decided to call her and Miles found himself overcome with love for the fourth time in his life. Love once again triumphed when, less than two years later a little boy joined them. James. James Todd Cobb. The suggestion of the middle name was Miles'.

Life could not get better.

But, of course, nothing lasts.

Miles knew Dom had introduced Mal into dreaming, he just didn't know how deeply she had become obsessed. When he got the call from the L.A. police, when he knew his beloved daughter was dead, that Dom was convicted of her murder, he knew immediately that Dom wasn't to blame.

Dreaming was.

That was what everything led back to. Everything that had ever gone wrong in his life had happened because of dreaming. Cecile had died alone because he had been preoccupied with a world that didn't exist. Mal had been neglected when she needed him most because he hadn't wanted a sad daughter. He had wanted the pretty, happy version he'd loved in his dreams.

And Mal, his beautiful, wonderful daughter, was dead because he'd infected the mind of one of his most promising students with the disillusioned ramblings of an old, regretful man.

He had to undo his mistakes. He had to destroy dreaming.

He loved Dom like a son. Killing him would destroy him, but it had to be done before dreaming ripped apart anyone else's lives.

Over the next year, Miles had carefully planned the destruction of dreaming, taking with it the lives of everyone involved with it.

He knew he would end up killing people, but he would also save many more, including his beloved grandchildren.

But innocent people wouldn't die. He couldn't allow that.

And so that was why, clenched in Arthur's sweaty hand in Room 313 the fuse-box of the bomb that had previously been strapped to the shoulders of Hannah Reese contained nothing but a receipt, documenting the purchase of four wires, a black plastic box and an LED alarm clock.

Miles Labouter wasn't an evil man, he was just a broken one.


	15. The Last Night in Limbo

**A/N – Thanks for all reviews, as always. In response to one or two queries, yes, I am hoping to be a writer one day. My major ambition is to be an author and/or a screenwriter one day. At the moment, I'm studying frantically for my maths and science GCSEs so I can drop them as soon as possible. Hence the slow updates. After I've finished all my exams they should arrive quicker. **

**I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and New Year. I got a new phone which I'm still trying to work out how to switch off. It's very nice and shiny, though. Even if I can't call anyone on it. **

**Without further ado, I bring you Chapter Fifteen of Chasing Mr X: The Last Night in Limbo. I hope you like it. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

The three men, weary with age and waiting, sat together in the warm glow of the fireplace, a lean tabby cat weaving in between their legs. They seemed to have nothing to say to each other, having already spent two lifetimes conversing and knew each other well enough to respect the silence. The wireless, perched on the end of rickety-looking table, whispered into the still air of the dark cottage, humming a Parisian Operatic number the three men knew as well as the age lines now engraved into the palms of their hands.

"How long?" asked the man sitting closest the fire. He was British and clean-shaven, a pair of expensive-looking, gold-rimmed spectacles perched on the end of his nose. Still handsome, even in his seventies, Eames stroked the cat absentmindedly, tangling his now frail fingers in the animal's long fur.

"An hour," the youngest man of the three said. This man was American and, less than an hour ago, had said farewell to his younger self. Now slumped in the shadow of a huge armchair, Dominic Cobb seemed to have aged a hundred years in the past few minutes which, Eames supposed, he probably had.

He turned to the last man in the room. He was Asian and his dark skin battled with the bright white of his hair. He seemed almost bent double, folded into the clutches of a battered old loveseat, his wrinkly old hand resting gently on his walking stick.

"It seems nothing, doesn't it?" Yusuf croaked, his words laden heavy with age and impatience. "What is an hour to a man who has lived for over a hundred years?"

"Everything," Eames breathed, staring into the vivid yellow of the fire. His mind was far away from the little cottage in the field and was instead lying somewhere on a dusty, burning highland, where tents fell like burning trees, uprooted by the ferocious roaring of a very different fire to the one currently captured within the grate in Cobb's living room. His mind did not stay there for long, however, and it was soon brought back to the little cottage when Cobb raised his voice.

"Do you think they've done it?" he asked, rubbing the upholstery of his chair absentmindedly with his fingertips as he spoke.

"Done what?" Yusuf asked.

"Disabled the bomb," Cobb replied. "Saved everyone." Eames squinted down at the cat purring peacefully in his lap.

"Yeah," he said. "Besides, if Arthur blows us all up, I'm going to kill him." The cat's ears pricked up as Cobb and Yusuf chuckled.

"We've been greedy, really," Yusuf pondered, squinting through his thick glasses. "We've lived the lives of two men. Are we entitled to any more?" They were silent for a moment.

"I've lived more than two lives," Cobb said. "If anyone here doesn't deserve any more life, it should be me."

"Does it make you feel guilty?" Eames asked, studying his friend. Cobb shrugged.

"Sometimes," he said. "But then I tell myself to stop being an idiot and snap myself out of it."

They were silent for a minute, the heat of the fire soaking into their wrinkled, dry skin.

"So," Eames said. "If we don't wake up in..." He checked his watch. "...fifty-five minutes, what will you miss most?"

"Phillipa and James," Cobb said immediately. "Without a doubt." Eames raised his eyebrows. "Ok," Cobb said. "I will also miss Jack Daniels..." They all sniggered. "...but when you have kids, your whole perspective changes."

"My cat," Yusuf said, eyeing Arthur the Cat wistfully as he purred in Eames' lap. "He's the sometimes the only thing I talk to for weeks on end when I'm making sedatives. Most of the people I work with tend to be asleep. They're not socialites."

"What about you?" Cobb asked Eames. "What will you miss most?"

Eames stared into the fire, as if trying to find the answer dancing in the flames.

"I'll miss this most," he said, finally. "I'll miss dreaming."

* * *

Hannah Reese had left as soon as she possibly could. As she was packing away her things, she'd mentioned something about courage, about getting a tattoo and kissing a boy named Jared, her reasoning being something to do with '...life being too short'. Her boss didn't quite know what had got into her, although hoped it was nothing contagious.

And so, after Arthur had woken Ariadne, they both sat slumped on the floor, against the side of the bed, alone and in silence - their minds unable to cope with both speaking and processing the events of the last couple of hours. An open bottle of whiskey from the hotel room fridge stood on the floor between them, its contents more than halfway down the label.

It was finally Ariadne that broke the silence.

"They'll wake up soon, right?" She nodded her head over to where Cobb, Yusuf, Miles and Eames were sprawled.

"I think we've got about five minutes for Yusuf, Cobb and Eames," Arthur replied, the simple mathematic easing his aching brain slightly. He took a swig from the bottle. "As for Miles, who knows where he's gone..."

"Where did you go?" Ariadne asked, knowing full well the question was very personal, but was so far beyond caring, she threw caution to the wind and asked him anyway.

"I don't know," Arthur replied, examining the bottle in his hands before setting it carefully back down on the floor. Ariadne couldn't help wondering if he was lying; she wouldn't blame him. "But it was nice there. I was with friends..." He trailed off and Ariadne knew she wasn't going to get any more out of him.

"Why did you come back?" Ariadne asked, staring at the man before her in awe. "You were falling to pieces...You nearly killed yourself saving me and Cobb. I thought you were all supposed to be heartless criminals."

Arthur was still for a moment, watching his hands folded neatly in his lap. Finally, he looked up, fixing her eyes on his dark ones.

"I did it because I love you."

And then suddenly, it was like there was nothing to say. After all, he'd answered her question and it was now her turn to think of a reply. Yet, as her brain became clouded with incomprehensible, panicky thoughts, she could only think of one possible solution to the current situation.

She leaned forward and, running a hand through his uncharacteristically messy, damp hair, trapped his lips in a kiss.

They broke apart only a moment later, her lips still tingling with the sweet taste of his.

"You don't have to do this," he said, his brown eyes searching hers, only millimetres away.

"Do what?" she asked, completely taken aback, her hands still tangled in his hair.

"Force yourself to love me." His words were whispered, calculated – almost pleading. "Out of pity."

It was then that it hit her.

Here was Arthur - handsome, brave, clever Arthur - presenting her with all his perfections, all his imperfections, having just very nearly killed himself in order to save her, now practically begging her to love him.

She grinned.

"I'm not forcing myself into anything," she whispered and, still grinning, captured his lips in another kiss.

This one lasted a little longer.


	16. New Friends

**A/N – Thanks for the reviews as always. I'm on 92 – the most I've ever had for a story. Thanks so much!**

**This is the last chapter, although there'll be an epilogue posted shortly after as I wrote it fairly early on. I hope you enjoy it. Feedback would be wonderful. **

**Thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

The woman with fluffy, yellow hair peered out from behind the shady rim of her straw hat, a stray tendril tickling her nose as it danced on the slight lingering breeze of the train pulling out of the platform. The platform was almost completely empty and the stillness seemed to hang heavily in the air, as if weighed down with great expectation and promise. Hanging baskets, with pansies and tulips spilling over their rims, hung from the walls, covering the timetables with their petals.

The train, pulling out of the station, was an old one and was painted a rich, royal blue, the word 'Charon' stencilled on the side in shining gold paint. It was a steam train and left a huge plume of purple grey exhaust in its wake.

The woman stepped further onto the platform, craning her neck as if to look for something.

A small boy, clutching a fistful of her skirt with one hand and sucking the thumb of the other, trailed after her, tripping over his slightly too-big shoes as he did so. The woman with yellow hair and the straw hat paused, grabbed his hand and gently extracted it from in between his lips.

"No, _mon petit chou-fleur;_ what did I tell you?" Reluctantly, the little boy obeyed his mother and dried his thumb on his trousers, still clutching her skirt nervously between his chubby fingers.

"_Maman!" _

The cry came from a tall girl, of about eleven years old, with dark, tumbling hair that fell into long waves down her back. She was standing in the foyer to the waiting lounge, her eyes were dark with excitement, rather than with sorrow, as they were so used to being.

"_Maman!" _she cried again, beckoning her mother over. "I've found him!"

He was sitting in the corner of the lounge, in an uncomfortable plastic chair, his hands folded in his lap as he read a book: Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less, by Jeffery Archer.

He looked up.

His hair was dark, his face unlined, although his eyes were still the same, unmistakeable grey of Miles Labouter – the broken, Parisian professor.

He froze for a minute, taking in the three figures – the woman, the boy and the girl – with an expression of bewilderment and disbelief.

"Where am I?" he asked.

The blonde woman, Cecile, stepped forward and wrapped his hand in hers.

"Home," she said.

And he was.

* * *

It had been odd waking up to find the Architect wrapped around the Point Man but then, Eames pondered, odder things had happened.

One of those odd things occurred when, having prised Ariadne off Arthur – something that required a great deal of strength and self-determination – he actually felt a rush of genuine affection towards his suave, immaculate colleague. So much so, he didn't tease him about his newfound love interest and instead decided to get himself a coffee from the hotel lobby. Before today, before the last few hours even, Eames had only felt a grudging sort of respect towards Arthur, something that was only revealed after a considerable amount of alcohol and persistent prompting from Cobb.

Something had changed.

Arthur had risked his life, endangered himself, in order to save them, If you still hated someone after they'd risked their life for you, you're a cold-hearted bastard.

Bastard he may be, but cold-hearted Eames most certainly was not.

And so, three hours after waking, it wasn't just the rumbling sound of guilt in his stomach that made him look for his new friend; he genuinely wanted to make sure he was ok. He'd disappeared about an hour ago, muttering something about getting some fresh air.

The lobby was busy and noisy, filled with talking, moving people. Despite this, he managed to locate a familiar, sandy-headed man sitting in the corner, staring solemnly at the mobile phone cradled in his palm.

"It's not going to dance," Eames said. "No matter how hard you stare at it." Cobb looked up, startled, before smiling sadly.

"I called him," he said, turning back to his phone. "Less than an hour before Arthur drugged me. I wanted to make sure the kids were ok. He said they were..." He trailed off.

"Where are they now?" Eames asked. "The kids?"

"Upstairs, in the room. They were more upset about missing the end of their dinosaur film than anything..." They shared another smile.

"Have you seen Arthur?"

Cobb frowned.

"No," he said. "I haven't. Not since we woke up."

"Ok." He gathered up his jacket from the arm of his chair. "Take care of yourself, Cobb."

He left, leaving Cobb staring after him, smiling smugly.

* * *

Ariadne was sitting in the garden, a glass of water clenched in her fist. It was pretty, Eames supposed, although not to his liking; there was altogether too much concrete and glass in New York for him to think any of it pretty, although the small patio at the back of the hotel did appear faintly pleasant, even to his critical eye.

He joined on a bench, next to a tinkling water fountain. The sun was low in the evening sky and it caught the light of the shimmering water, glinting on the glassy surface.

"So," Eames began. "You and Mr Perfect." Ariadne looked at him, her eyebrows raised.

"What?" she asked. "Jealous?"

"Not at all – I've seen the way you leave your stuff lying round. You're not my type."

"I didn't mean of me."

"Sod off."

They sat together in silence for a minute, Ariadne smirking, Eames scowling.

"Speaking of Golden Bollocks," Eames said, a moment later. "Do you know where he is?"

"I think he's on the roof," Ariadne said, taking a sip of water. "Said something about needing to think..."

Ariadne was right.

He found him standing, silhouetted in the glow of the setting sun, staring out across the city.

He was standing perfectly still, his dark eyes glazed and unfocused, obviously not grounded on the rooftop of the hotel. Even as Eames watched, he felt a twinge of unease. There was something about the profile of his friend that, as he looked on, didn't seem quite right. Something about him had changed.

He cleared his throat.

Arthur started and wheeled round, his expression nervous and vulnerable.

"You alright?" Eames asked, stepping forward until he was next to him, the pair of them now staring out across the city.

"Yeah. You?"

"I'm fine. Always am." They were silent for a minute. "You know," Eames began awkwardly. "We may have had our differences in the past but...well...I think you're...alright. If you know what I mean."

Arthur stared at him, his face almost comical as the look of shock and panic flashed across his features.

"Yeah," he said, equally as awkwardly. "You too...you know. You're alright." Eames nodded and scratched his nose.

"So..." He suddenly said, trying to pretend as though the last few seconds hadn't happened. "You and Ariadne, huh?"

"Yeah," Arthur smiled nervously. "She'd great."

"Great?" Eames repeated. "She's bloody wonderful. You do realise that if you hurt her, I'll bash your face in, don't you?

"Yeah...yeah, I do."

"Good." They were silent again for a moment and Eames enjoyed the feeling of the deliciously warm sun on his face. "Right," he said, his eyes still closed. "I'll leave you to it." He turned and clapped him on his shoulder. "I meant what I said," he added, seriously.

"What," Arthur asked. "About bashing my face in?"

"No," Eames said. "Well...yeah. But the bit about you being alright. I meant it."

"Yeah. Me too."

He left him there, on the roof with only the sun for a companion and it was only as he was walking through the hotel lobby, about to check out, that he realised what had been wrong with his friend's profile.

On the tarmac, underneath his feet, there had been only bright, orange sunlight.

Arthur hadn't got a shadow.


	17. Epilogue: Belonging

**A/N – So here it is, like I said: the epilogue of Chasing Mr X. I'd like to thank all reviewers for their kind words and harsh criticism. Every word is invaluable and I thank them for their time and perseverance. **

**I actually wrote this around the time I wrote Chapter Nine, so I've had this planned out for some time. Bearing this in mind, I hope it satisfies and doesn't disappoint. If it is disappointing, please don't hesitate to yell at me via review. **

**For the very last time, thanks for reading. Reviews are great - Ellen**

* * *

Paris glistened in the glow of the early morning sun. The air was calm and still, laden thick with the smell of coffee and sleepiness. It was an almost lazy morning, the sun bright and bold, although not stifling, seeming to make everything look daintier and prettier than usual.

The pastel-coloured buildings appeared to consist of sugar in the cheerful sunshine, the fragments of ground glass in the masonry sparkling slightly. An old-fashioned bicycle, broken and bent out of shape, leant against the oldest part of an antiques shop, rusting artistically.

Arthur turned the teaspoon over in his hand, examining it in the clear light. The coffee shop was busy, buzzing with conversation and laughter. Everybody seemed to be dressed smartly, like Arthur himself, and was clutching laptops – the very epitome of sophistication and class.

"I've always loved it here," said the woman sitting opposite Arthur. Her voice seemed musical and it hung in the still air for a moment, as if waiting to be noticed. "I know of nothing as beautiful as Paris in spring."

"Maybe," Arthur said, turning to look at her. "Although you say a lot of things you don't mean, don't you, Mal?"

The woman named Mal looked at him for a minute, her large, dark eyes searching his.

"What do you want?" Arthur asked, deciding to skip the pleasantries. "After all, you only ever find me when you want something."

"That's harsh, Arthur." Mal whispered, picking up her own teaspoon and twiddling it between two elegant fingers. "I am not as cold-hearted or as selfish as you think."

"No?" Arthur suddenly felt a wave of anger, smothering all sense of decorum and tact. "You knew, didn't you?" He spat. "You knew what life would be like for me. I can't taste anything, feel pain when I bleed, feel the warmth from the sun...it's all gone …as I should be." He paused for a moment, staring angrily at her lowered lashes. "You knew you were condemning me to a half-life, an empty life..."

"I did it because I had to," Mal's words were quiet, yet firm and made Arthur stop in his tracks. "What alternative did I have?" she asked, her eyes now glassy as she stumbled over some of the longer words. "I couldn't watch Dom die...not like that..." She broke off suddenly and Arthur felt ashamed; she'd had to watch as her father had plotted and schemed against the man she loved. His stomach twisted as he thought of Ariadne and he frowned at his coffee cup.

"I'm sorry," he said, fiddling awkwardly with his napkin. "That must have been terrible." Mal didn't reply. She just stared at him, her eyes hollow and empty. Arthur didn't blame her.

He reached for his coffee cup and, as his fingers brushed the smooth, enamel surface, he recoiled, burned by the scolding hot tea.

"Ah!" he exclaimed as he shook his hand. Then he stopped, the tingling sensation of pain slowly ebbing as realisation dawned. "I felt it," he murmured, looking at his fingers in wonder. He flexed them, marvelling at the glorious power of his nerves streaming down his fingers and into his palm.

He tore his eyes away and looked at Mal, who was staring at him, unperturbed.

"Why can I feel it?" he asked, turning his hand over to inspect the pads of his fingertips. They still hurt and were reddened by the heat.

Instead of providing answers, however, Mal simply asked another question.

"How did we get here, Arthur?" she asked, leaning forward over the table until Arthur could see the solid brown of her irises.

Something clicked inside him. He remembered that Mal had flecks of green and hazel in her eyes. It was as if this detail had...been forgotten?

"I'm dreaming," he said, his heart sinking slowly as he leaned back in his chair, almost to distance himself from her. Mal nodded.

"You're lying in bed in a New York hotel room," she said. A few of the customers sitting next to them turned to face her, their expressions ones of shock and disgust. Mal smiled at them courteously before turning back to Arthur.

"How are you here?" he asked, his tone resigned and bitter. Mal suddenly looked shifty.

"Arthur," she began, twiddling her teaspoon between her fingers. Arthur remembered she always used to fidget when she was nervous. "I brought you back to do a job," she said tentatively. "And you've done that job – very well, I might add. But now that job is over and...you don't belong with the living anymore." Arthur remained motionless, still leaning back in his chair as he stared at her through narrowed eyes.

"What?" he asked quietly, his voice carefully controlled.

"I've come to take you back, Arthur," Mal said, reaching out to grasp his hand, which he swiftly removed from the tabletop and placed on his knee. Hers came to rest uselessly on the sugar bowl.

"Take me back where?" he asked.

"The other side," Mal replied. "Where I found you. To death."

Arthur's eyes snapped shut and, taking this as a sign of defeat, Mal continued.

"When you fell from the lighthouse, something inside you died and, without that something, you'll never be able to feel anything, to live a full life. Death is where you belong now, Arthur," she said. "Death is where I've come to take you."

Arthur's eyes flew open.

"No," he said, his eyes fixing unblinkingly on hers.

"What?" she asked, aghast.

"You're wrong," he said, unmoving. "I don't belong in death." Mal frowned.

"You don't get to choose these things, Arthur," she said, shaking her head slightly. "It's already been decided."

"By who?" His voice was loud and angry. More customers turned to look at them. Mal didn't answer. "Well I guess they'd better un-decide it," he continued. "Because I'm not going anywhere. And, for your information, I can feel something." He leaned forward, until he was looking Mal directly in the eye.

"I'm not going to die," he breathed, his face mere inches from hers and, for a second, he seemed to detect a flicker of fear behind her blank irises.

"You're already dead, Arthur," she replied stubbornly, although her tone displayed her sudden nervousness.

"No I'm not," he said. "Not until I decide I am."He paused, "I'm not going anywhere," he repeated solemnly.

Mal leaned back in her chair, distancing herself from him. She seemed to study him for a moment and Arthur couldn't tell if she was about to smile or grimace. Eventually, she frowned and Arthur knew what she was about to do the millisecond before she did it.

He knocked the Browning Pistol out of her hand the moment she brought it up to his forehead. It fell onto the table with a crash and, immediately, his subconscious turned to stare at them.

"Not very friendly," he said, smirking the way he knew she hated.

"This isn't a joke, Arthur," she said, now angry and bristling with irritation. "You can't escape who you are."

"Actually," he said, getting up from the table. "I think I can." The world started to collapse around them, the walls of the coffee shop crumbling and sending the other customers running.

Mal stood, dust and rubble coating her elegant suit.

"Death will find you Arthur!" she shouted after him as he started to walk away from her, sidestepping a hysterical middle-aged woman. "No matter where you hide, death will always be able to find you!"

"We'll see about that," his words were whisked away from his mouth as the dream collapsed around him.

Arthur's eyes flew open. It was dark, the faint glow of the lights outside filtered through the light cotton of the curtains, drifting in the whispering night breeze. New York City buzzed beneath them, its vast wing spread like an avenging angel beneath the hotel room's balcony. He could hear the wail of a distant siren a few blocks away, battling with the noise from the midnight traffic

He was in bed, the covers pulled up to his chest and, as he rolled slightly to his left, he nearly crushed Ariadne, who was bundled up into his side, her face resting on his chest.

Smiling slightly, he stroked her cheek and pulled her closer, unable to feel the warmth of her body but he knew it was there all the same. She sighed in her sleep and nestled into him, her nose squashed slightly by his collarbone.

If Mal wanted him to die, she was going to have to wait a little longer.


End file.
